The Analyst
by epicsilverbullet
Summary: As an Analyst, Percy Jackson is used to having to protect the lives of famous people from ruthless assassins known as Mechanics. But as the arrival of his cousin and the details of his next job both coincide and life gets a lot more complicated, he starts to unwind the conspiracy of the assassins and uncovers dark secrets about his past that he'd prefer to have stayed hidden.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: So, I had most of this chapter written, but then my stupid computer decided to shut down and delete the whole chapter :(. But, (like problems with stupid oblivious guys) I decided not to let it bother me that much, and I took it as an opportunity to improve my writing.**

**Anyways, since I wrote "The Mechanic" (based on the movie about an assassin who takes another under his wing, if you haven't read y story on it, you should!) I've always wanted to do a story on the opposite side of things- the analysts.**

**More will be explained in the story, so here it is! Reviews would be great!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO**

* * *

**Percy POV**

I didn't think my swim trunks could conceal a glock that easily.

Then again, I never thought I'd be dodging bullets next to James Bond before my morning cup of coffee, either.

I lay down on my front on the bottom of the pool, directing my snorkel camera up towards the surface, ten feet above, and I watched as Daniel Craig dived in, swimming freestyle up and down the length of it. Right on time.

If that sentence sounded...not normal to you, then don't worry. Because I am definitely _not_ normal.

I flicked a switch on my snorkel cam and it immediately switched from camera (allowing me to view things behind me or above me) to a new thing I had installed, called Kevlar x-ray.

Kevlar...is like this kind of crazy freaking supermetal. Great for everything, lightweight, low cost, you name it, Kevlar could do it, or it could help you do it. And right now, it was helping Daniel Craig's assassin hide.

His assassin (or Mechanic, as they're called) had come in early this morning, as the pool was still being automatically refilled, and drilled a square hole, big enough for him to fit, in the the side wall of the pool. Knowing that Daniel Craig comes here every morning at seven, he had then fitted a Kevlar sheet over that hole after getting in, and, underwater, everything seemed to bleed together into one blue-gray blob, but, to take an extra precaution, he spray-painted it the same color as the pool sides. Then he hid in it and covered the gap with the metal. He was well-hidden, very well hidden actually. And if you're wondering how I know all of this...I was there. In the same position I'm in now.

Daniel Craig didn't notice me, because I'd sprayed myself with some magical solution the guys at the lab came up with. Makes you're skin just about transparent, and, this deep in the water, you might as well be. That's how neither the Mechanic or his target noticed me; camouflage, something I pride myself heavily on.

I checked out the heat sensor in the corner of my snorkel came, and saw two very interesting things. There was a line of zero body heat that was wrapped in a huge mass of body heat (that I assumed to be the Mechanic) inside his hiding place, and I'd bet my camouflage that it was a handcuff tied to a stone. I'd seen that one a lot. The Mechanic's plan was simple, enough, really, but it's the simplest ones that are the most effective. He'd drop the stone so it was anchored at the bottom of the pool, and then snap the handcuff around Daniel's (a.k.a James Bond's) wrists, thus, anchoring _him _to the bottom of the pool.

The heat sensor tingled, and I knew it was the Mechanic tightly wrapping his hand around the handle to his metal sheet. When Daniel passed by him, he'd open the hatch (probably scaring him into shock) and simultaneously drop the stone and handcuff him, getting up and out of the pool and walking away as if nothing happened.

It kinda sickens my mind to know the kind of people out there.

Of course, this guy wouldn't just kill people for the fun of it. There was, in fact, a whole agency dedicated to the Mechanics. Three leaders, the intel guys told me, and twenty-three assassins. The leaders would pay the assassins to take out targets (usually famous people) and the Mechanics would do it, getting a check in the mail for their hard work. Simple, really.

Except, for them, at least, it isn't.

That's where the analysts come in. I, of course, am one of them, but there are others- twenty-two others, to be precise, and we had an agency, part of the FBI, dedicated to analysts. Our job, basically, is to find a someone being targeted by a mechanic and then save his or her life. Pretty exhilarating work, to me, and it wasn't easy, either. Mechanics just have to do it, analysts have to be there before it happens. Know what the Mechanic's going to do before the Mechanic knows he's going to do it. That's what makes analysts even more elite than mechanics.

Back to the current situation at hand.

In a few seconds, Daniel would be right where the Mechanic is, and I saw through the thermal vision camera in my snorkel that he was wearing a mask. Usually, mechanics weren't foolish enough to have others (or cameras) catch them, but it was always a necessary precaution.

Of course, you might be thinking: How can my snorkel work ten feet underwater?

Well, that's because it isn't really a snorkel. If I have it out in public, I can't let anybody see any of the heat sensors, or the little compartments hiding C-4, or the snorkel cam, or anything. So, the guys over at intel- geniuses, by the way- designed a way to fit everything into a snorkel. So whenever anyone sees me wearing a snorkel... that's what they'll see. Just a snorkel.

I liked it so much, though, that I even gave it a name- Riptide. I liked the water so much, growing up (in the summers, I practically lived in my town pool) and the name "Riptide" just sounded so...awesome to me. Epic. Rolls off your tongue.

The target passed by the Kevlar and I grinned to myself, feeling the familiar rush of adrenalin. This is where things would get interesting.

The world's most powerful people, the most famous ones, feel like they're untouchable.

They're dead wrong.

The Mechanic popped out of the hatch, scaring the target half to death, and he pulled out his stone-and-handcuff creation.

But I was already there. I unsheathed the knife out of my multipurpose swim trunks and slashed at the handcuff, trying to detach it from the stone. No success, and I cursed at myself as a Catch 22 appeared.

The Mechanic was already swimming up to the surface, either about to get away or kill us, neither of which would be good. Meanwhile, the target was slowly sinking to the bottom of the pool, struggling to no avail against the heavy stone weight, losing air fast.

Suddenly a warning beep flashed in my snorkel cam, and I swore again as I noticed that my air tank was less than a minute away from losing all its air.

Thinking on my feet, I grabbed Daniel's wrist and hoisted him up to my level, still five feet below the surface (thank whatever gods watching over me that water is almost zero gravity) any stuck the knife into the handcuff's locking mechanism, jimmying the lock. I looked over at the target and saw that his eyes were slowly closing, and I let the rock fall to the bottom of the pool and realized, with a start, that I had no air left, as I pushed him up to the surface. We were so close...four feet, three, two, one, six inches...

Then bullet holes started peppering the surface of the pool.

I swore again and looked up outside the pool, to where the Mechanic was shooting at us. I knew from experience (and watching Mythbusters) that the bullets wouldn't hurt us as long as we were in the water; the problem was that we were out of air, and both of us were already feeling the effects of oxygen deprivation.

In less that a second, I looked at the large room that housed Daniel Craig's pool, and suddenly formulated a plan.

The room was fifty, sixty feet high, and I knew that he could handle the height, doing all of his own stunts in the James Bond movies. That would be crucial if we wanted to live. There was a balcony built about thirty feet up that wrapped around the whole length of the room- probably for the guards watching him swim (who were probably disposed of or sent on a wild goose chase by the Mechanic). There were dozens of conveniently placed ropes dangling from the balcony, probably to swing from when Daniel had friends over. And if they held (which I had no doubt they would) we would come out of this alive.

As soon as I got the plan (which took less than a second) I chucked my knife out of the pool, higher, farther, and faster than necessary in order to reach the gun. The water had a dampening affect on all of this, though, so it sailed with perfect trajectory, knocking the gun out of the Mechanic's hand and sending it skittering away. That bought us around ten seconds, all we needed to survive.

I gave one last strong kick of my legs, and both of us flew out of the pool, taking huge gasps of air. We hoisted ourselves out of the pool and surveyed the situation...the Mechanic couldn't leave now without killing us. So, we just had to avoid being killed. The gun, though his primary source of defense, was also his weakness. We disarm him, we beat him. How do we disarm him? We make it hard for him to hit us. How do we do that? Well, it's a good thing I'd wrote a scene like this for the new James Bond.

I looked over at Daniel, who had just finished catching his breath. We locked eyes and nodded simultaneously. He could ask questions later about why his stunt partner was saving his life.

We split up, me running around to the right of the assassin (around the pool) and he ran to the left of the assassin (around the pool, also), and the Mechanic hesitated for just a second before swinging his gun out to shoot at me. A split second before he pulled the trigger, I dove through the surface of the water, and a split second before _that_, I saw Daniel shimmy up to the balcony and jump off on one of the ropes.

_Perfect,_ I thought, _Just like in the movie._

Except now, it was real life and death.

I dived down to the bottom, then kicked off the floor, blowing myself out of the water with such force that I landed, in a crouch, on the side of the pool. Daniel was holding on to the rope, running sideways along the walls towards where we were, in the middle of the room, next to the pool.

The Mechanic raised his gun, but I dove to the side, causing him to have to readjust, and I pulled my own gun out. This was the most dangerous part of the plan.

Daniel, still holding on to the rope, kicked off the wall, swinging towards us. He would pass right above us, but still be about five feet too high. I gritted my teeth, waited until exactly the right moment, and then-

_BANG!_

One round. One, nine millimeter bullet was all I needed.

It severed the rope from the ceiling (the rope Daniel was swinging on), and the Mechanic looked up, startled- to see James Bond fall on top of him, knocking him to the ground, out cold.

I took away his gun as the FBI swarmed into the room (because of the distress call I sent out).

We walked over to them, and Daniel, surprisingly still calm even though someone made an attempt on his life, said, "I get the feeling your name isn't Jason Wright, and that you aren't really my stunt partner."

I laughed and clapped him on his bare back. "You're right. I'm neither."

"Kinda weird to think how the stunt safety crew gave us all those safety procedures when it's fucking foolproof in real life."

I laughed as we reached the FBI, some of whom were loading the Mechanic into a police car to be incarcerated, and the chief spoke to me. "Helluva job, there. Did it go well?"

I exchanged a look with James Bond. "It got done."

An analyst operative started to walk over to us, and I knew that she would be the one to tell Daniel what the hell was going on with his life. I looked at him. "She'll tell you more," I said, gesturing to the operative.

He was probably still confused, but said, "What happens now?"

"Well," I said, "If all goes well, we'll never see each other ever again." His face fell, and that filled me up with pride a little, "But if we never do- it was cool working with you, Dan. Don't forget me."

He grinned as the FBI led him away. "I won't."

I turned back to the chief- Captain Sutherland. "It's always nice, you know? Working with appreciative guys like him?"

He chuckled as we stepped out of the house, into the morning sunlight. "There's no one better than you, you know? You're a goddamn machine."

I chose not to answer that as we walked into town, probably for the celebratory Vanilla Frappuchino. Just another day in the life of an analyst.

I wouldn't be able to say that for much longer.

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**A/N: I've always wanted to write this, and I think it turned out pretty good. My goal is five reviews per chapter, but more would be nice, so REVIEW!**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews! I'm not a big review demander, but...could I...possibly get more? Just a simple, "nice job" or, "I like it!" is enough.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO**

* * *

"Did it go well?"

"It got done."

Silence.

"There's no one better than you, you know? You're a goddamn machine."

Luke Castellan grinned and took another swig of his beer, eyeing the chicks on the dance floor of the bar. He turned back to Chief McKenna. "They still think it was the doctor."

Chief McKenna chuckled. "They still think it was the doctor," he repeated, "Do they really think Michael Jackson would take horse pills?"

Another swig of beer, accompanied by a brief spell of light-headedness. "I- I don't know. But the drugs you gave me? They worked. Like hell they did."

Chief McKenna raised an eyebrow. "Like hell they worked? What is that supposed to mean?"

Luke gulped down the rest of his beer and set it down on the bar with a satisfying thump, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "I don't give a damn. I'm gonna go to one of those chicks over there," he said, pointing in the vague direction of the dance floor. He made his way over there, staggering and tripping the whole way.

The Chief chuckled and took another gulp of his drink, when his phone buzzed. A text message.

He brought it out and checked the message. It was from Dean. One of the bosses. A new mission, for Luke, he guessed.

He opened it up and read the details.

_Hmmm,_ he thought upon reading the target's name, _Where have I heard that name before?_

* * *

**Percy POV**

One Vanilla Frappuchino later, I was all sugared up and ready to take on the whole goddamn world. I guess it was good that Chief Sutherland decided to spring the next mission on me.

"You know," he said slowly, obviously choosing his words carefully, "Now, the Mechanics are down to only twenty-two in number. You've got a shot at seven of them now."

I raised an eyebrow at him. "Seven? For just one person to handle?"

He grinned. "Come on, Jackson, think! Do you know how big this would be? How big of a blow to the assassins?"

I sat back down in my chair. "I guess..." I said slowly, "But it's going to be one hell of a tough mission. How long do I have to prepare? Two weeks? Longer? I gotta find a -"

"That's the thing," said the Chief, "The seven will all be in the same bar in half an hour."

I just stared at him for a while. Then-

"WHAT THE F-"

"But you're a trained professional," he said, "the best one we have."

That calmed me down a bit. People say flattery doesn't work- that's bullshit. Works like a charm, on me, at least.

I sighed. "Don," I began, "You can't just-"

"Twenty-nine minutes."

I groaned. "So, how do I do this? Arrest all of them at once? What about the target? What about-"

"The reason I thought you'd do this is because the target is a man by the name of Nico di Angelo."

"My cousin? Are they insane?"

Chief Sutherland looked a bit troubled at this. "See," he began, "You and I aren't the only ones who noticed that Nico's gotten a little suspicious of you. You disappear, an attempt on Eli Manning's life is averted. The same thing happens with Jonah Hill. Then Eminem. And now, James Bond."

"What do you mean, Nico isn't the only one?"

"The Mechanics know, too. They're starting to get on your case. Yours and a few others. You won't be able to hide for much longer."

Somehow, that doesn't surprise or scare me. I can handle Mechanics. I know I can. "But...why would they need seven to kill Nico?"

"I don't know," he shrugged, "Who knows how their twisted minds work? All I know is, you can hit eight birds with one stone in twenty-eight minutes, and you can't exactly back out of it."

I stayed silent, mainly because I knew he was right.

"Where is it?"

* * *

"This is a bad idea..."

It was a pretty normal day at the bar, I guess. People were getting hammered, drinking way more than was probably good for them, and there were others dancing on the floor- at the moment, I saw a black-haired girl dancing with a guy who had sandy blond hair. It was hard to spot the Mechanics, though- the one thing they did best was camouflage.

I did spot my cousin, though. He wasn't drinking, and, thankfully, didn't appear to be too drunk. He was leaning against the far wall and talking to some girl. Nothing dangerous.

Though the girl he was talking to...she looked a little familiar... where have I seen her before?

I looked back at Chief Sutherland. "How much time?"

He looked down at his watch and shrugged. "None. They should be going now."

Cue seven guys, simultaneously breaking away from their spots at the bar and making their way to where Nico was. One of them was the sandy blond guy.

Cue me, walking over to them.

Nico curiously looked around at the guys approaching him, but said nothing as one of them came up to talk to him. I made sure to turn away from them so no one could see my face.

In the few seconds I had, I frantically looked around, trying to formulate a plan. No luck. Guess one good, old-fashioned bar fight is going to go down.

Whoop-de-fucking-doo.

"I never know what to say in these moments," said the guy who was talking to Nico.

"What moments?" Nico replied cooly.

"The moments right before I kill someone."

Nico's eyes widened, but I was already there, catching the blade of his knife with mine and disarming him, sending it skittering across the floor. In the brief moment of hesitation, I decked three of the guys and they fell to the ground, out cold.

"Percy?" asked Nico, "How-"

"Help me!" I said, gesturing to the four remaining guys, "Ask questions later!"

He had no choice but to agree. Everyone else in the bar was either passed out or too drunk to care, so we couldn't be expecting any help. Chief Sutherland, interestingly, was nowhere to be seen.

_Think later. Fight now._

Almost telepathically, we divided up the remainder of the guys. Both of mine converged on me and backed me into a corner. One experimentally swung a fist at me, but I ducked. I was safe for the moment, but I knew they were just toying with me.

I snuck a quick glance at Nico and saw that he'd already knocked one of the guys unconscious. If all else failed, I might be able to rely on him for-

_WHAM!_

A hard, metal object slammed into the side of my head, and I fell to my knees, seeing stars. It hit me on my arm, and I collapsed to the ground. I could feel warm blood running down my arm as the guy raised the metal object for a third time, to finish me off.

The one part of me that could still think rolled to the side to avoid the deadly projectile. I swung up my good arm and hit the guy in his manliness, and he clutched the front of his pants, dropping the metal pipe in the process.

I grabbed it, and, in one swift move, swung it around, knocking the two guys straight off their feet. They hit the ground, out cold.

The pain in my head subsided as I stood up, but there was still a subdued ringing, and my left arm burned like hell, dark red blood still oozing out. I could see Nico standing above his two guys, and I walked over to him, surveying the six mechanics, dead to the world, laying on the-

Wait, six?

My head snapped around in the direction of the door, but it was too late- the sandy blonde haired guy was already on the street, hopping into a black Toyota Camry and speeding away.

I cursed and, momentarily forgetting about Nico, made my way over to Chief Sutherland, who was sitting at the bar. "Where the hell were you?" I hissed.

He looked pointedly towards the door, and suddenly, the FBI burst in, gathered the seven- no, six- unconscious assassins and dragged them out.

I turned back to him. Of course he'd call backup! "Sorry," I said, "but we're going to have to do something about Nico."

Chiron Sutherland raised an eyebrow. "What would you have to do about Nico?"

I looked at him incredulously. "Are you serious? He just saw everything! We're going to have to-"

He smiled. "Well, here comes Mr. di Angelo now. He looks ready to talk. I'm sure you'll figure something out."

I cursed again and looked back, and sure enough, there was Nico, with a look on his face like, "You'd better explain to me what the fuck is going on."

I turned back to Chiron- but he was gone.

I turned back (again) and was met with my cousin, Nico. He opened his mouth, but I cut him off.

"We'll talk outside," I said, pointedly looking at the drunkards in the bar, "no telling what they'll tell other people if they overhear us."

I could tell he had a lot more questions, but he nodded and we left the bar, walking out into the cool evening air of New York City.

* * *

We walked for a while until we came across Bryant Park, where there weren't many people around this time of the evening.

It was now that Nico turned to me and started spouting questions. But they _definitely _weren't the kind of questions I was expecting.

His eyes shone with admiration, and he said, "You- you're a _freaking analyst_! Like- like, Jeremy Renner was, in Mission Impossible! When he let Tom Cruise's wife die! THAT IS THE COOLEST FREAKING THING I'VE EVER HEARD IN MY LIFE!"

Sometimes, I have to remind myself that my cousin is three years younger than me. And a whole lot less mature.

I couldn't help but grin. "Yes, Nico, I am an analyst." Then my expression hardened, "But, listen, you can't tell anyone about this. I'm going to take you back to the FBI, and we'll give you a pill that'll erase all memories of-"

He shook his head, cutting me off. "That's a violation of, like, my friggin rights to privacy. Perce- don't you get it? I want to know what you know!"

I gave him a grim smile as we continued walking. "Go online, it's all on the Internet."

"But I don't want to read about it! I want to do it!"

I thought back to what Chiron said. _You'll know what to do..._

I then thought back to when the Mechanics found us in the bar. How Nico was able to take them down a whole lot faster than I was. I touched my arm wound, which had stopped bleeding and had turned into a nasty bruise, and winced. It would've been good to have someone like Nico to help avoid things like that from happening.

I looked at him for a while. He wasn't much shorter than me, we were about the same height. Short, stocky build- pretty strong, too. And he radiated this aura, somehow, of- "You mess with me, you don't know what you're getting yourself into". Not a bad guy to have on the job.

Then, the events that happened that day hit me, at the same time Chiron's words did.

I feigned an exasperated sigh and said, "So, there are these people. Called Mechanics..."

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**A/N: Sorry for the long update time, but...how did you like that? **

**I know the story I wrote on the other side of things, "The Mechanic", was short- only seven chapters. I can guarantee this will be longer. I haven't finished writing the whole thing, so I don't know how much longer, but definitely, like fifteen or so chapters. Maybe more.**

**Anyways, can we make it to seven reviews? That's only five more- there are stories that get hundreds of reviews, but all they get is five or six per chapter. So I could I get about the same? PLEEEEASE?**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews! **

**I got 150% more reviews on the second chapter then the first. If that trend continues, then by the time I finish my story with the estimate of 15 chapters, I'll have...over 300 reviews! Yay!**

**Anyways, if any of you are following my stories 21 Jump Street or Dear Percy, I bet you're _super_ pissed that I haven't been updating them, and I'm extremely sorry for that. It's just that for Dear Percy I'm figuring out a way to continue it and strengthen their relationship without having the plot be the same for every chapter. And for 21 Jump Street, I just watched the movie again yesterday with my cousins and it's fresh in my mind, so expect updates to come within the next few days.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO**

* * *

**Two weeks later...**

I looked behind me at my cousin, who was ten feet back, breathing hard. "Try to keep up!"

"Eff you!"

I chuckled and turned back around, resuming the planned course we had.

It had been two days since the major takedown at the bar, and yesterday Nico was officially induced into the world of the Analysts, and the kid absolutely _loved_ it. It's like...like he found out he was a freaking god or something. Dancing around, all that shit. His first mission will remind him what the real world is like.

Anyways, this was another short assignment that the _lovely_ Chief Sutherland had sent for us, barely two hours notice, and we were off. No preparation time, nothing.

It was a tough first mission for Nico, but the whole Analyst agency was barely a year old, and we were already getting a huge breakthrough, what with the six we brought down two days ago. Every Mechanic we take down brings us one step closer to our ultimate goal.

For this assignment we were to be jogging past an apartment building. A Mechanic would be riding up an elevator, out to assassinate his target. We had to delay him or stop him, using any non-fatal means necessary.

We had to look like legitimate joggers though, so we started off three miles back. We'd pass the building, do our job, and continue on the next seven miles like a couple of regular joggers out on a regular morning jog. Nico only had a day of Analyst training, and he was in fairly good shape, but ten miles was still a lot.

I rounded the corner and slowed my pace down considerably, so we could talk while jogging.

"You know the plan?" I asked him, and he nodded.

I saw the building two blocks up ahead. "Get ready."

We flicked a switch on the side of our sunglasses, activating the elevator x-ray the guys at intel custom built for this assignment and took a break at West 42nd, a few blocks down from Times Square. We ran through the plan one more time.

"Find the Mechanic riding up the elevator," he began, "Intel will be watching and they told me he just entered the building."

I nodded in agreement. "Freeze the elevator he's in. Send in FBI. Continue jogging."

"And if that doesn't work?"

"We're fucked."

"Dumbass."

Nico grinned and we started up jogging again, a block away. "Plan B is to go in and manually do it."

"And if that doesn't work?"

"Shoot it."

I nodded grimly, now only a few seconds away from the building. We usually didn't like to pull out guns. There was the obvious risk of civilian fatalities, and of course that would cause a ruckus among the people around us. The Analysts do have this thing called the Mist, though, like the memory-thing from Men in Black (don't tell Nico- he'd flip), but there's just...something about messing with people's memories? For real, not in a movie, that just doesn't seem right. We prefer to have our work done discreetly. And not in the way the Mechanics do.

Both Nico and I turned to look at the building, just as a casual gesture from two normal joggers on an ordinary, everyday morning. Except it wasn't.

This was one of the tougher missions, even for me, because it had to be done within a few seconds. That's all the time we'd have to pass the building.

Intel spoke in my mic. "The pea is in the pod, I repeat, the pea is in the pod."

Silly, cliche, "Hurt Locker" quote to say, but it communicated everything we needed to know.

I turned to Nico. "Now."

Nico pressed the "Home button" on his "Iphone" as I looked at the elevator system, and sure enough, saw a man in an elevator stop short, halfway up the building.

I grinned and slapped five with Nico. "Nice job, Nic-"

I took a second look at the elevator and my smile faltered. Something didn't seem right...

I made a split-second, life-or-death (literally) decision, and turned to Nico. "Plan C!"

"What the fuck is-"

I hit the mic on my sunglasses, direct pipeline to intel. "Code red, I repeat, code red!" Another useful quote. Thank whatever gods are looking down on me for "The Hurt Locker".

I leaped up and just barely caught the bottom rung of the fire escape, hoisting myself up, as Nico followed my lead. "What's going on?" he asked, ignoring the suspicious stares we were getting from people around us.

I shook my head and started to leap up the metal handles and rungs, a real-life Jackie Chan, swinging up with the grace of...something that's graceful.

"Stay down there!" I ordered, aware that what I was doing was impossible for Nico to do. I tossed him what seemed to be a normal ballpoint pen. "Men in Black!" I yelled, disappearing up the fire escape. I prayed to the same gods of "Hurt Locker" that Nico would get my drift.

I focused on swinging, leaping, and climbing my way up to the twenty-fourth floor. It was hard for a man to beat a machine, especially when the machine starts twelve stories above the man- but I'd have to try.

Quicker than I thought possible (blame the adrenalin) I landed on the fire escape outside the targets room on floor twenty-four, breathing hard. I looked in his window and saw him walking to the door. I thought back to a few seconds ago. Intel had warned me that the Mechanic had just rung the targets doorbell. I swore under my breath. I only had one possible solution, and it was one that I would have like to have avoided.

_Fan-freaking-tastic, _I thought as I leaped through the window, shards of glass flying everywhere.

You know all those movies where they show people heroically dive through a pane of glass and then just get up and run away ten seconds later? That's complete bullshit.

First off, glass is pretty hard, so you dive through it and it has a dampening effect. I landed only a little bit away from the windowsill.

Secondly, all the glass that falls on the floor when you break through the window? Yeah, you land right on it and it hurts like hell. I'd definitely have to go to the ER after this. Plus, it can break bones, too. And it goes _everywhere_.

Thankfully, the target had whirled around and was staring uncomprehendingly at me, effectively stopping the door from opening for a few seconds, but I could see through my x-ray that the Mechanic was raising his gun- silenced, too, so it would be like someone cracking their knuckles.

I could feel warm blood oozing out of places I didn't even know I had, a few of my ribs were snapped, making it hard to breathe, and I was starting to feel a little light-headed due to pain and loss of blood.

But I had to save this guy's life. My vision started to darken around the edges, and that was when I knew I was losing a _lot_ of blood, (Note to self: try to avoid diving through windows for rest of life.) but I leaped forward, pulling out my gun and tackling the guy to the ground.

In a split second, I fired three shots through the door, and I knew they all hit the Mechanic's leg, rendering him immobile, at least for the time being.

The target and I hit the ground, and the pain of my broken ribs seemed to hurt even more, if that was possible. As the Mechanic went down, however, a single shot went off from his gun, and I tried to move out of the way of the bullet, but it hit me right in the chest, and, before the first wave of pain hit (which I knew would render _me_ immobile), I hit a button on my "Ipod" and managed to send a distress call. One to Nico, one to Chief Sutherland, and one to the FBI. They could track the location of the distress call and be there within five minutes.

Then a wave of searing pain hit, and I fell to the ground, succumbing to the pain, my vision slowly going dark.

* * *

**A/N: Hehe. I killed Percy.**

**Deja vu, much? To the second-to-last chapter of The Mechanic?**

**Anyways, reviews would be greatly appreciated! And sorry if this chapter is a little short. Annabeth and Rachel/Thalia will be introduced later (not sure whether to make this Thalico or RachelxNico- any suggestions?)**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Ahem. You guys are the first story I'm updating after...the incident, so I'm going to have this whole rant, mmk? You can just skip to the story if you don't want to listen to it, so...I don't own PJO. Yay.**

**So, my dad is in a fantasy football league with these twenty or thirty other guys or so. For those of you who don't know, fantasy football, in essence, is you pick a team based on players you think will do good, and the success of the individual players in real life determines how many points you get, thus determining how many "fantasy points" you get. My dad is in a special type of league, a simpler one, where you just pick a team every week that you think will win. At the beginning of the season, everyone puts in a decided amount (for them its $15) and every week, if you're right, you move on, and if you're wrong, you lose.**

**So this week, the Detroit Lions were playing the Tennessee Titans, and he picked the Lions to win, because they have a great offense that's underrated against a defense that sucks after they traded Cortland Finnegan, so basically the Lions were set. To make a long story short, the game was epic, and a real nail-biter, but the Lions managed to tie it at the last second, and the game went into overtime. **

**Fast forward into overtime- there are complicated rules, but basically, the Titans kicked a field goal (3 points) and Detroit was in field goal range (the area of the field where a field goal can be easily kicked). And it was fourth down and 1. Basically, if the Lions kicked a field goal, they'd be tied again and the game would go into sudden death (next team to score wins). However, if they went for it on fourth down and got a yard and then scored a touchdown (7 points) they would automatically win the game.**

**The Detroit coach decided to go for it on fourth down (which was stupid, because the field goal was easy to make, and a safer option) but he changed it to a trick play in which Detroit wouldn't snap the ball (start the play); instead, they would try to draw the Titans offside (they would try to make the Titans commit a penalty, which would, in turn benefit them). However, the center (the person in charge of starting the play) didn't know that, so he started the play. The quarterback was like, "WHADDAFUQ ARE YOU DOING?" and he tried to make it, but he failed and the Titans won.**

**SO NOW I FEEL LIKE GOING TO DETROIT AND TAKING SIX FRIGGIN THOUSAND DOLLARS OUT OF THAT CENTER'S PAYCHECK FOR MAKING US LOSE SIX THOUSAND DOLLARS! AGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!**

**Anyways, thanks for listening/ skipping the rant! Enjoy the fourth chapter!**

* * *

_Percy impatiently tapped the computer screen, as if that would somehow hurry up the slow network connection on his webcam. Blame the ADHD. "Come on, come-" the smiling faces of his wife, Savannah, and his eighteen-month-old daughter, Hailey, filled the screen, and his face lit up. "Savannah! Hailey!"_

_His wife grinned and bounced Hailey up and down on her knee, making the little baby gurgle happily. "Hi, sweetie!"_

_Hailey grinned and reached her hand towards the screen, as if that would bring her closer to her dad. "Dada!"_

_Percy's grin got even wider. His daughter's first word. "How are my two favorite girls doing?"  
_

_"Well," said Savannah, "It isn't quite the same without you..." she wiped a glob of drool off of Hailey's chin, "When are you coming back? It's been two years, right? I mean, they've got to let you come back at some point..."_

_The Navy SEAL sighed and rubbed the back of his neck nervously, an old habit. "That's the thing..." he began, "They said two months, six months ago. I don't know anymore. Hopefully soon."_

_Savannah's face fell, and even Hailey seemed a little downcast at that. It absolutely broke Percy's heart that he wasn't there to witness her birth. "Okay," said Savannah, and she tried to smile a little, "We'll do this again same time tomorrow, okay?"_

_Percy smiled back. "Definitely. I love you."_

_She blew a kiss through the computer screen and giggled. Her husband's boyish good looks had been the death of her ten years ago, and they were the death of her now. "Love you, too."_

_Percy closed the computer screen and turned to Travis Stoll- he couldn't tell which twin was which before they told him that Travis was a little shorter than his brother, Connor. "When's the plane leaving?"_

_"Ten minutes," replied the mischievous soldier, grinning, "The wife and kids still don't know?"_

_Percy shook his head and smiled at no one in particular. "I'm hoping it will be a good surprise. Yours don't know either?"_

_Travis shook his head and grabbed Percy's hand, hoisting him up off the rocky ground of the Iraqi desert. "I just want to friggin...go home. See Katie and Alex. What kind of father isn't around when his daughter's born?"_

_Percy stayed silent as the final boarding call for the flight back to Manhattan sounded over the loudspeaker (as if they'd leave anyone behind, or as if anyone would miss the flight) and threw an arm around Travis's shoulders, taking the weight off his fellow SEAL's shattered leg. "You'll be home before you know it."_

* * *

_Savannah frowned as she read the new text message on her Iphone. _

_"Get in the car. You and Hailey."_

_It was from Percy, but she still didn't quite trust the ominous-looking black stretch Hummer sitting idly at the end of the block..._

_Then Silena Beauregard popped out of the passenger seat, waving hi to her, and she grinned, grabbing Hailey and her shoes, and going down the driveway to meet her old friend. "Hi!"_

_Silena grinned and tickled Hailey under the chin, causing her to giggle happily. "Hi, cutie!"_

_Savannah smiled. She trusted Silena more than most people, save Percy. "What's up with all of this?" she gestured towards the Hummer._

_Silena shrugged. "I got a text from Charlie, and Katie got a text from Travis. The driver's someone we don't know, but they want us to go somewhere. Maybe they planned a surprise for us?"_

_Hailey turned her head around to look over Savannah's shoulder, and she hoisted her up, trying to shrug at the same time. "Sure. Let's go."_

_The ride was uneventful. Hailey seemed to be having a serious conversation with Alexandra in baby talk, while Silena (baby-less) sat up front with the driver. Katie and Savannah, besides the original greeting, stayed silent, contemplating what could the boys have done this time._

_The ride was short, too, and after barely ten minutes, the driver turned around. "We're here."_

_Still wondering what was going on, Katie (holding Alex) and Savannah (holding Hailey) got out of the car, along with Silena. They were in what seemed to be a deserted parking lot._

_Savannah turned around to look over her shoulder- and her heart stopped._

_Hailey was pointing towards a Coach bus, gurgling happily, but Savannah was more focused on the tall, handsome man standing in front of it with a huge grin on his face._

_She shoved Hailey into the arms of a laughing Silena and ran over to Percy, leaping into his arms and knocking him against the side of the bus. "OW," he said, "BUS. STUPID BUS."_

_She shut up his mindless rambling by kissing him, and at one point, someone came up to them, but Savannah just waved them off and kept on kissing Percy. _

_When they finally pulled apart, though, she socked him in the arm before throwing her arms around his neck and laying her head on his shoulder. ""Why didn't you tell me you were coming?" she said, tears of happiness spilling down her face. _

_She could hear the grin in his voice as he drew circles on her back. "I wanted it to be a surprise."_

* * *

_The man in the blue button-down shirt walked down the hallway at a brisk pace, throwing a black blazer on his shoulders. He turned to the Mechanic next to him- a new recruit, sandy blonde hair and electric blue eyes. "You know the plan?"_

_He seemed a little nervous (expected for his first job) but nodded. "I've got it down."_

_The man nodded. "Analysts don't know shit about us. We've only got one leader, why would we need any more?"_

_The new Mechanic seemed a little hesitate. "You- you are the leader, right?"_

_The man's golden eyes pierced through the Mechanic's blue ones. "Why would you think otherwise?"_

_"I- I didn't-"_

_The boss waved him off. And when the boss told you to do something, you did it. "Get this done quickly and discreetly."_

_"I will."_

* * *

_The man in the jeans and blue shirt wiped the tears off of his wife's eyes. "Now you know."_

_She nodded and drew him in for a hug. "Percy, I just- when you said you were going out to do the groceries, and you came back hours late with all of those cuts, I just- I didn't know what to think, you never told me..."_

_It crushed Percy's heart to see Savannah like that and he pulled her closer to him, kissing the top of her head softly. "I didn't like lying to you. But you understand, right?"_

_"I would be more okay with it if you didn't do a...dangerous job like that, though."_

_Percy shook his head. "That's the thing- you know how I couldn't deal with normal life after coming back from Iraq! I have to do something to take me out of that, something to-"_

_"Percy, this isn't the Hurt Locker! We aren't actors, it isn't a movie set! This is real life!"_

_Percy's eyes flared. Both he and his wife had extremely short tempers, and to rile either one up was to court death (quoting the dude from the Avengers). _

_He just couldn't bring himself to yell at his wife, thought- especially not with Hailey sleeping upstairs. He loved them too much,_

_Tears brimming both of their eyes, he grabbed his hoodie and headed out the door, calling over his shoulder. "I'm- I'm going for a walk. I'll be back-" after a moments hesitation, "- I love you. Both you and Hailey. Never forget." And then the door shut._

_He had barely taken two steps when the house went up in flames, and the loudest boom he'd ever heard in his life filled his ears and knocked him off his feet._

* * *

_The man with the gold eyes grinned as he watched the camera capture the final dying screams of two people he knew were fully innocent. He didn't care._

_He turned to the sandy blonde haired guy with blue eyes. "You did well."_

_"Thank you."_

_"Make sure to keep it out of the papers. I don't care how much money you spend, who you kill, who you fuck, whatever. Freeze Jackson's phone lines, too, and set up the invisible fence. No one can see this, no one can know what happened."_

_"I'm on it."_

_"Good..." his gold eyes bored into the blue ones, and the Mechanic gulped, "You know what has to happen? What he needs to think?"_

_"What? Didn't we-"_

_"You know what I want him to think? That two people died. And no one cared."_

* * *

**Percy POV**

I sat up straight in bed, a thin layer of sweat covering my body. For a second, I didn't know why I was in a blue hospital gown, or why my ribs felt like they were shattering, or why there was an IV sticking into my hand, or why a bunch of people in lab coats were worrying over a stupid thing like a loud, fast beeping sound. All I was thinking was my wife and daughter were dying, burning alive or crushed in that house, and I had to do something, I had to save them, I had to-

Then the needle sank into my arm, and everything immediately went dark.

* * *

The next time I woke up, everything was much better- it was a dreamless, thoughtless sleep (due probably to the knockout drugs), and when I looked at the calendar above my bed, I saw it was a week since I dove through the glass to save a life.

I sat up in bed, feeling much better- my ribs weren't too bad (at least, they didn't hurt whenever I breathed), and most of my cuts were patched up. I was even dressed in my regular clothes again. Modern medical marvels. Amazing what you could do in a week with a patient who isn't going to protest.

I swung my legs out of bed, and Nico and a doctor were immediately by my side. The doctor said some stuff about how I was fine to leave, and how if I experienced anything out of the ordinary, I was to contact them, and blah, blah, blah...

What I was really focused on was the look on Nico's face. The boy had something to tell me, and it wasn't anything good.

We walked out of the hospital and down the street (mostly empty at this time of the morning), and I turned to him. "What's up?"

He got right down to it. "The target you saved? He died. Two shots went off of the Mechanic's gun, and one of them hit him. You were lucky..." he trailed off, unable to finish.

I didn't answer for a while. I survived and he didn't...he probably had a wife, kids, a life to go back to. How could-

Nico decided to interrupt. "I mean, why do people even give a shit about these Mechanics or Analysts? It's not like-"

Something inside of me snapped. Maybe it was because the memories of my wife and daughter flashed through my head coupled with what just happened, news of a failed mission, but I completely lost it.

I grabbed Nico's arm and twisted it behind his back, causing him to wince in pain. "Just shout it out to the world, why don't you?" I hissed into his ear, "Anyone out here could be one of them, they hear anything, they'll paint a bulls eye on your back, understand?"

He grimaced in pain as I let him go, and he fell to the ground. "Two people died ten months ago," I said, walking away from him, talking about my wife and daughter.

"Percy-" he said, holding his elbow, "I didn't mean-"

"And no one cared."

* * *

**A/N: That came out pretty dark, didn't it? Anyways, reviews would be greatly appreciated! Review!**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews, guys!**

**Have you ever had one of those "faith in humanity restored" moments? I'll tell you one of mine.**

**So I had to attend this mandatory meeting to figure out what kinds of things to do to earn high school volunteer hour credits, and I was in a bad modd because it's extremely stressful.**

**But then (my friend's dad dropped me and my friend to the place), when we were driving back, we were listening to a pop radio station, and they were doing this thing where they play songs from the 90s. And the song they played was "My Name Is", by Eminem, one of the songs that made him famous.**

**Well, it turns out that my friend's dad listened to Eminem in the 90s, too, so basically we just sang it really loud in the car with the windows turned dowm, like. "HI! MY NAME IS! WHAT! MY NAME IS! WHO! MY NAME IS! CHICKA-CHICKA SLIM SHADY!" And I don't know why it was a "faith in humanity restored" moments...it just was.**

**Anyways, thanks if you listened to my rant. And- eep! THE MARK OF ATHENA CAME OUT TODAY! I pre-ordered it on my Nook but I haven't read it yet...but I will! Don't spoil it for me if you've read it!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO**

* * *

**Percy POV**

As soon as I stepped over the threshold into my apartment, the hate fueling me died down, and I immediately regretted what I did.

Of course, it wasn't any of Nico's fault that he found something jacked up with the whole "Analyst/Mechanic" thing- after all, who wouldn't? He was just at the wrong place, the wrong time, and all the things I'd managed to control up until that point had burst out. I needed to apologize.

I'm not a very prideful guy- that is, I don't let it rule my life-, but there does seem to be something kinda weird about twisting a guy's arm and then going back fifteen minutes later to apologize. But I guess I guy's gotta do what a guy's gotta do, right?

Before I left, though, I checked my phone for any messages, and there was one from Chief Sutherland. The newest targets to protect. Nico and I were to report to headquarters in two hours to receive further details. Understandable, because there was too great a risk of sending classified information through a text message.

If there was any doubt of me apologizing to Nico, it was gone now. We were wanted for our next assignment.

It took a while to locate my cousin (he had a talent for disappearing to the shadows at will, somehow), but after years of knowing him coupled with about as many years of living in Manhattan, I figured out where he'd be.

Thirty minutes after I received the text from Chiron, I pushed open the door to Lady M's Boutique on Madison Avenue, past East 78th street, and stepped inside the long, narrow cake shop, regarding the lone customer, who was sipping a cup of espresso and reading the Times.

Hell if I knew what to say to him. All I figured was that he wouldn't be too happy about what I did. But I walked to the white, modern-looking table and sat down in the chair opposite him. "Hey."

He looked up and downed the rest of his coffee, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "Hey."

Uncomfortably, I looked down. "I, uh- I'm sorry about my outburst. I know it wasn't fair to you-"

He put a hand up "Don't mention it. I knew that what I was getting myself into wouldn't be easy."

We stayed silent for a while. Then- "I forgot to ask. A week ago, did you get the Men in Black reference?"

He grinned. "Yeah. Not to mention it was the coolest thing I've ever done. Nothing else could surpass that."

I stood up and grinned back. "Ten bucks says you're wrong. We've got another assignment."

* * *

Thirty minutes later (an hour earlier than requested), I threw open the door to a Bank of America on Fifth. I looked at Nico. "Might as well give me the ten bucks right now."

"Hell no."

I walked up to the teller, who smiled up at me. "Welcome to Bank of America, how may I help you?" she asked.

I scratched my forehead- three times, dropping my hand down so two fingers rested on the counter. "I need to make a withdrawl."

She nodded and typed something on her computer. Of course I knew what it was that she was typing. "I see. And do you have your Bank of Americard on you?"

I nodded but pulled out my Driver's License instead. She clocked the information into the computer and handed me back my license, along with a key. "Take the second left," she said, pointing to a door to the left of the desk, "Have a nice day!"

I nodded and smiled back. "Thanks."

I beckoned for Nico to follow me and pushed the door open. We came out into a huge room lined with vaults from floor to ceiling. I made the second left and kept going until I reached my vault. 156B.

I looked back at Nico, who hadn't said anything yet. "Ten bucks mine yet?"

"Still no. This is just a bank, man."

I smirked to myself, putting the key in the lock and twisting it around. No audible click sounded, but the key unfolded until it was a nine millimeter. The vault swung open.

If Nico was amazed by that, he didn't show it, but followed me as I stepped inside and flicked on the lights- lights that wouldn't be there in a normal back vault.

Making sure to secure the door behind me, I shot a hole in the back wall and put my eye to it. The retina scanner accepted my DNA, and the back wall of the vault slowly moved apart until it wasn't there anymore.

What _was_ there, however, was the Analyst headquarters.

It was a room the size of Madison Square Garden, with two levels in it. Upstairs was intel's territory- they're the ones who monitor the agents in the field, the ones who come up with all the James Bond gadgets, the real geniuses behind the whole organization.

The main floor was the Analyst's territory. This is where they come to receive details of their next assignment, where they come when they're first recruited to meet their boss, where they come for preparation before missions- where they get the cool gadgets they need to live.

Nico was an interesting case; since he'd been thrown into this crazy world, he hadn't had any time to come here.

I looked over at him and chuckled at the sight of his eyes, glazed over at the wonder of all of it. Wordlessly, he reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, and handed me a ten. That makes me eight packets of Skittles richer.

I was waiting for the crazed techno-geek fangirl that was my cousin to show up, but it didn't come. He just stared around the room as I programmed his DNA into the retina scan, so now he could enter. I gestured towards headquarters. "Come on, let me show you around."

I gave him a basic tour of the place, and (still thirty minutes early), I pushed open the door to Chiron's office, to find him sitting at his desk, deep in thought.

Without a word, I shut the door behind us and Nico and I went and sat in the two chairs in front of his desk. "You called us over, Chiron?" I asked.

He smiled warmly at Nico and nodded. "Yes. A new mission."

"Who do we have to protect? How much time do we have to prepare? Do we get cool gadgets like in "James Bond" or "Alex Rider"? Are the people we're going to protect famous? Are they hot girls? Are we-"

_That_ is the crazed fangirl that was my cousin.

I hid a smile and said, "Nico, let Chiron finish."

He fell silent, but I could tell that he had about a million other questions.

"There are two of them," Chiron explained, "both of them, young women. Why the Mechanic agency wants them dead, we don't know." He tossed two files on the desk, one to Nico and one to me. "We have to assume that the Mechanics have ulterior motives."

Nico opened the file and scanned through it, while I left it untouched. "Ulterior motives..." I mused, "And why would they have ulterior motives if the women aren't well-known celebrities?"

Chiron stroked his beard. "That's the thing, my boy. We don't know-"

"Annabeth Chase and Rachel Elizabeth Dare."

I whipped my gaze around to Nico, who had both files open on his lap and was intently studying the pictures. "Them? From 22 Jump Street? How could we not notice?"

Chiron, however, seemed to have figured it out, rather quickly. He nodded slowly. "I fear," he said, "Nico is right. Those are the two young women from the movie. And another thing I fear- I know why the Mechanics are targeting them."

I shook my head. "Back up a sec- how can you tell it's them? In these pictures, Annabeth is blond and Rachel is a redhead. In the movie, they're both brunettes!"

"Ever hear of disguises?" Nico countered.

"That doesn't prove anything!"

"Look," he said, showing me snapshots from a scene in the movie next to the pictures from the file. "See Annabeth's gray eyes and Rachel's green ones?"

"Yeah..." I said, not being able to see his point.

"They're the same in both pictures."

"A lot of people have-"

"Those can't be mistaken. It's them, all right."

I think I was more pissed that Nico got the answer when I didn't, but if there's one thing I'd learned from years of work in the field, it's that no one is anyone's sidekick. What matters first and foremost is saving lives.

I leaned back in my chair and turned my attention to Chiron, who'd been watching our exchange with an amused look on his face. "So tell me. Why do you think you know why he's targeting these people?"

He stood up and started pacing around the room. "Think," he said, "Who are the people you've saved?"

I tried to remember off the top of my head. "Eminem was one," I said, "But how-"

"Do you know what his background is?" Chiron stopped pacing, eyes boring into mine, "Raised on the streets. One of the toughest people living. Seems natural the Mechanics want to kill him."

I was still confused. "But why-"

"Don't you see it?" he asked, shooting a glance at Nico. "Nico sees it. They're targeting potential recruits for your agency. They're trying to take all available options away."

I pondered this for a second. "But then, why those two," I said, referring to Annabeth and Rachel, "What's so important about them?"

Chiron took a seat. "There could be a lot of things," he began, "They could've had a spy in the production crew, noting their athletic ability. There were a lot of stunts in the movie, weren't there?"

I nodded slowly. "I guess...I see your point. We protect them. Save their lives."

Nico, who had stayed silent for a while, spoke up. "How long do we have to prepare?"

"You have two weeks," he said, "Study up until you've memorized everything by heart. At the end of that, report back here for further details." He stood up, holding out his hand to us. "Gentlemen."

We stood up and shook. "Thanks, Chiron," I said as we turned to leave.

On the street outside the bank, Nico turned to me and grinned. "Awesome! Our first job! What do you think will happen after we save them?"

"If we save them," I corrected.

"Oh, come on!" He scoffed, "Don't be so pessimistic!"

I shook my head solemnly. "It's happened before."

He decided to drop the subject and move onto a different one. "What do you think about what Chiron said?"

I shrugged. "I don't think it's ever happened before, with most of the targets being too famous and easily recognizable. But, with that being their first movie, and with them having the disguises... they aren't too famous. I think that they'd be recruited if we save them."

Nico raised an eyebrow. "It's never happened before?"

"Nope. The others are too well-known. Far as I know, these two have only been in one movie."

"But- you told me about Daniel Craig. Didn't the Analyst operator tell him everything?"

I shook my head solemnly. "She used the Mist on him. That's why no one remembers anything."

Nico nodded acceptably, and we walked back down fifth avenue, with no ideas about what the next few months would have in store for us.

* * *

**A/N: I know, I know, the ending sucks. But this was more of a filler. Next chapter is when they meet Annabeth and Rachel! Percabeth and Rico supporters FTW!**

**Anyways, sorry for the long update time. And reviews would be awesome!**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N: Sorry for the long update time! And, just so you know, I'll update again when we hit fifteen reviews, okay?**

**I'm having a bit of a writer's block with 21 Jump Street and Dear Percy. I've written the next chapter for both of them multiple times, only to delete it multiple times. I'm hoping to update soon, but...I don't know.**

**On a more happy note, Percabeth and Rico in this chapter! And, sorry for the time-lapse thing and the POV changes- I know it can be annoying, but it was the only way I could find for this chapter to work. Another filler chapter, by the way-sorry about that, but things will definitely get more interesting.**

**IMPORTANT AUTHORS NOTE IMPORTANT AUTHORS NOTE IMPORTANT AUTHORS NOTE**

**I finished reading the Mark of Athena, and it was awesome! I had a lot to say about it, and I updated my profile about it, so go check that out. Other than that, I have one thing to say, which will be posted onto all of my stories.**

**SPOILER ALERT!**

**So, in the book, Piper and Leo say a lot about how they expected Percy to be more...grander, and better than how he was? Like, they don't like him that much?**

**Well, you know what I have to say to you, Piper and Leo?**

**(Warning: this next paragraph is profanely explicit)**

**FUCK YOU PIPER AND LEO, YOU WEREN'T THERE WHEN PERCY SAVED THE WORLD FIVE FRIGGIN TIMES, SO YOU TWO CAN GO FUCK YOURSELVES AND BUTT-FUCK SOME OTHER PEOPLE, BECAUSE WE HAVE KNOWN PERCY LONGER THAN YOU HAVE, SO YOU SHOULD SHUT THE FUCK UP AND GET THE FUCK AWAY FROM PERCY AND ALL THE DIE HARD PERCABETH FANS!**

**On another note, there was a lot of Percabeth in the Mark of Athena. YAY!**

**Disclaimer: I don't own PJO**

* * *

**Percy POV**

**Two weeks later...**

Nico and I were back in Chiron's office again. The files were on Chiron's wooden desk, and he gazed wisely at us over the top of his glasses.

"It's been two weeks," he began, "have you studied and memorized the files thoroughly?"

Nico and I both nodded assent. As I knew, and as I had reminded Nico, studying the files could very well mean the difference between life and death.

He nodded. "Good." he turned to Nico. "Have you finished college yet?"

Obviously piqued by the change of subject, Nico shook his head. "I'm on summer break, which should end in a month. I'm studying bio-engineering, though."

Chiron shifted his gaze over to me. "And Percy. What did you do in college?"

I shrugged. "If I wanted to, I could drive downtown right now and get a job in marine biology. I kind of already have a full-time job, though."

Chiron nodded again, content at our responses. "Here's the plan," he said, leaning forwards and addressing the both of us, "exactly seven days from now is when Ms. Chase and Ms. Dare begin their fourth and final year at college. NYU. I've arranged for you, Nico, to be Ms. Dare's roommate, and you, Percy, to be Ms. Chase's roommate. It's doubtful that you will have many classes together, but at least you'll be able to keep an eye on them."

Nico waggled his eyebrows up and down. "Mixed-gender two-person dorm, eh?"

Neither Chiron or I smiled. I turned to my cousin. "Nico," I said gently, "it's saving lives we're talking about here. This is serious stuff."

Nico's smile disappeared, replaced by a look of determination and seriousness. "Okay. I gotcha. No casual acquaintances."

Chiron continued. "The problem is, we don't know exactly when the Mechanic will strike. We don't even know if it's one assassin or more than one. All we know is that it's going to happen at one point, so just...see where the year takes you. The trick will be to know of their whereabouts at all times without arousing suspicion."

Nico raised a hand. "Question. If they're going to be recruited, then why do we have to do this discreetly? Won't it be easier just to tell them?"

I shook my head. "Nope. You do that, the target starts to get afraid. Walking down the street, their eyes will linger on every person they see longer than usual, to try the determine if they could be the killer. More sweating, more shaking, stuttered speech, they'll look around a lot more often. Of course- these are really subtle and minor details to normal people, but a dead giveaway to Mechanics. It's like sending up a flare to those... those monsters from the depths of hell," I said, talking about the Mechanics,"like saying- _Hi! Please rearrange my face!_"

Chiron nodded. "Yes," he agreed, "in a crude way- their scent gets stronger if they know who they are. It's natural. Save the talk for after they're saved."

He stood up, and my cousin and I followed suit. "I wish you good luck," said Chiron, shaking our hands, "god knows you'll need it. The rest of the mission is up to you."

* * *

**Two days later...**

I groaned and shut off Sports Center. "NICO DI ANGELO!"

He bounded down the hallway to my apartment, which was where he'd be staying until we'd leave for NYU. "What's up, Percy? Though that's a derogatory term for "What do you want", or "What is it". But, I don't care, That's normal speak in modern language, thought the derogatory term "modern" can mean a lot of-"

"Nico, how many cans of Dr. Pepper did you drink?"

"Ahhh, Dr. Pepper, you ask? Should be called nectar of the gods, in my opinion, at least. You know, Target was having a sale on "Buy 1, Get 1 FREE!" of the eighteen-packs, so, naturally, I had to buy one, so-"

"Thirty-six cans? Have you packed for NYU yet?"

"Yup and nope! But I have an excuse; the thirty-six cans of soda were so good, almost as good as the time I-"

I took a deep breath and stood up. "I'm sorry, man," I said before swinging my fist around and connecting with the side of his head. Nico went down hard on the floor, which must have hurt since we were in the basement and the floor was solid concrete. I winced at the dull thud his body made as if came into contact with the floor.

I helped him, though. That seems to be the only remedy for sugar high coupled with ADHD.

I threw a few weeks worth of clothes into his suitcase, along with basic toiletries, and filled a backpack with his electronics and college supplies, muttering angrily the whole time about how an adult like him could be so irresponsible.

* * *

**3rd Person POV**

**The next day...**

Nico and Percy, suitcases in left hand, backpacks slung over one shoulder, schedules in right hand, looked up at the community of dorms (that looked somewhat like an apartment building) in downtown Manhattan, near NYU.

Percy turned to his cousin. "Well...I guess this is it."

Nico nodded. "Yeah," but Percy could tell there was something else on his mind. "Is this going to be...one of the tougher missions?"

Percy wished Nico was at the age where he'd believe a sugarcoated explanation, but those times had passed, and he could only nod grimly. "I wish I could say otherwise, but yeah."

The couldn't think of anything else to say, so Nico gave his cousin a curt nod. "See you around, I guess," before shrugging his backpack higher on his shoulder and heading to the left wing elevator, en route to floor eight.

Percy nodded back. "See you around," and watched his cousin disappear from sight. He sighed at the prospect of going back to school and wheeled his suitcase down to the right wing elevator, en route to the twenty-seventh floor.

The elevator ride for Nico was relatively short, and before he knew it, the doors dinged open and he stepped out onto the eight floor, navigating the complex Labyrinth of hallways until he found what he was looking for- Dorm 813.

With one last glance at his schedule to make sure he had the right dorm, he gave three sharp raps on the door. _Rap, rap, rap!_

Rachel Elizabeth Dare had on a denim skirt and a light blue tank top, her red hair tied back in a ponytail as she worked intently on her newest painting- an abstract she had titled _"Strange Occurrences," _depicting numerous...well, numerous strange occurrences- when she heard three sharp raps come on the door.

Carefully setting her paintbrush down on the palette and the palette down on the bar stool she was using as her seat to paint on, she wiped her pink-and-blue painted hands on her ratty, interestingly-colored skirt as she made her way to the door, ready to welcome her roommate for the next year, a guy named Nico di Angelo. She heard he was Italian? Well, she'd have an Italian roommate, then.

When she opened the door, however, what was standing out there was definitely _not_ any old Italian roommate.

She could tell how handsome he was just by looking at him, which might seem pretty redundant to hear, but that's because to understand, a snapshot of Nico di Angelo had to be taken and observed. In other, more scientific terms... he was a Grade-A _hottie_.

Nico di Angelo had always known that Rachel Elizabeth Dare was gorgeous, from seeing her movie, but he never expected this...just...just, _wow_. He'd always had a thing for tomboyish girls for some reason, and an even bigger thing for girls with ponytails. But tomboyish girls with ponytails? He was sold.

"Umm..." he stuttered, holding out his hand awkwardly, "I'm...I'm Nico di Angelo."

Rachel gulped, trying not to look at his general chest area, and awkwardly took his hand. "I'm. Rachel- ah, Rachel Elizabeth Dare."

Twenty-nine floors up, Percy hefted his backpack higher on his shoulder, and, after checking that he did, in fact, have Dorm 2794, he knocked on the door.

Annabeth Chase was working furiously on the pre-pre-pre-assesment study guide blueprint for her advanced Architecture course, when a knock was sounded on the door. That made her jump, breaking the tip of her carefully sharpened pencil and leaving an extremely messy, barely detectable (to a microscope) dot, half a millimeter to the left of where it should have been.

Steaming mad, she got up from her desk chair and (after checking to make sure her Cheetos bags weren't carelessly scattered around her roommate's designated space), she stalked over to the door, about to give said roommate a piece of her mind.

When she saw her roommate, though- oh, dear god.

Instantly, she knew that this guy was the oblivious type, for two reasons. One was that _no guy_ on earth could be that good-looking and not have a cocky grin on their face, flirting with every girl they saw. The second was that, unlike most guys she was around, she felt at ease with this guy, and she felt all her anger wash away. And if someone could get her over messing up a blueprint, she knew they were all right.

She extended her hand and smiled warmly at her roommate for the next years. "Hi! I'm Annabeth Chase."

The first (and only) girlfriend Percy Jackson had ever had in his life had once told him that (in response to him asking why girls cared about hair and shoes so much) that hair and shoes were all part of the ridiculous game of impressing males. They broke up after Percy commented on how males were mostly interested in the stuff in between. In between hair and shoes, that is.

But Annabeth Chase- _everything_ about her was perfect. And he'd never felt like a guy from a 50's musical more than he did now._  
_

She had blonde princess curls recklessly pulled into a ponytail (something about that just made Percy like her even more), and intense gray eyes that made it feel like she was boring into his soul when she first looked at him.

But then, her features melted into a smile, and he felt like he'd just discovered paradise, cheesy as it sounded. She was one of those people who could smile or laugh and make everyone around them feel good about themselves.

Hair- check. That was gorgeous. Shoes- barefoot. Something really sexy about that, though Percy wasn't sure what. Stuff in between- oh, god. Don't look, don't look, don't look...

He was too busy failing at not looking that he almost didn't notice when she said something. He blinked. "Uh...what?" he said, probably sounding like an idiot.

Annabeth suppressed a smile. Definitely the oblivious type. For some reason, that made him cuter, and she found what he'd said irresistibly adorable. "I said- Hi! I'm Annabeth Chase!"

Percy blushed and shook her hand. "Percy Jackson."

As Nico and Rachel shook hands, Percy and Annabeth simultaneously did the same. And what was even more interesting was that they were all simultaneously thinking the same exact thing, all four of them.

_Oh, this is going to be a problem._

* * *

**A/N: Yes, more of a filler, but it will start to get interesting in the next chapter. Reviews would be greatly appreciated! And check out my profile!**

**-epicsilverbullet**


	7. Chapter 7

**A/N:** Hi! I'm back!

*avoids sticks and stones and atom bombs*

This story kind of took a backseat...sorry...and there was that whole fiasco with Hurricane Sandy knocking out power and then the nor-easter, to add insult to injury, but I'm fine now, and mostly everything is back up, meaning you get an update!

**IMPORTANT IMPORTANT IMPORTANT**

I know there was some Percabeth and Rico in the last chapter, but I've kind of skipped that as of now...you'll see what I mean in this chapter. Just imagine that Percy and Annabeth are like how they were during TLO, but _before_ the kiss at the pavilion. And imagine that Rachel and Nico are the same.

And without further ado, here's chapter seven!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO

* * *

"WHAT?!"

Percy Jackson winced and held the phone away from his ear as the truck bounced up and down, which only gave him and Nico a better way to hear the numerous curse words spouted by Chiron. The two Analysts shared a helpless look, and Percy warily said, "Hey, we- we were- I mean, it wasn't exactly _our_ fault, I was just going up to Nico's room to tell him what you told _me_, which technically makes it your-"

"I DON'T CARE! HOW DO YOU NOT NOTICE-" Chiron stopped, and Percy and Nico could hear him take a deep breath on the other end.

"Let's figure this out, okay?"

* * *

_Twenty-four hours earlier..._

It was unnerving to Percy. Extremely unnerving.

He'd been Annabeth's roommate for just over a month now, and his mind had been going crazy with worry. When would the Mechanics come? What would they do? How would he deal with them? How many would there even be?

It also didn't help that Annabeth Chase was extremely gorgeous, and the thought of her sleeping less than ten feet away from him every single night for the past month had driven him completely _insane_...for some reason.

Sure, they'd become good friends- it was kind of hard _not_ to when two people were holed up in the same house fourteen hours a day- but it was unlike any other friendship Percy had ever had. He felt as if he'd known Annabeth for his entire life, when it had really only been around a month.

He took another swig of his Miller Lite and turned his attention to Monday Night Football as Annabeth opened the door and stepped into their two-person dorm. "Man!" she said, tossing her stuff on the ground and flopping down on the couch next to Percy, "I'm dead tired. Tests in Bio, History, and Chemistry- I'm not even majoring in any of those, so what's the point of even taking them?"

This was a new side of Annabeth, one that he'd never seen before. The one that threw stuff on the ground instead of putting said stuff away and chastising others who refrained from such behavior. The one that saw no point in certain aspects in education.

The one who's half-bare legs were right next to him, on the couch.

Nervously, he said, "I- uh, I agree."

She popped open another can of beer and looked at him curiously. "Are you all right?" she asked, taking a swig of her Dr. Pepper, removing her ponytail holder and shaking her hair out in an attractive way.

Percy swallowed, a cold sweat starting to break out on his forehead, and he gulped down more of his drink to hide his awkwardness, which probably didn't help. Making sure not to look at the lower half of her body, he nodded. "Yeah."

It didn't help that the upper half of her body was just as attractive.

Mercifully, it was at that moment that his phone rang, saving him from an awkward moment, and he checked the caller ID. It was Chiron.

Instantly, his brain was flooded with alarming thoughts. What could have happened? Did it relate to the mission he was currently on? What the hell could possibly be going on?

He worried too much.

"Shit!" he cursed. He looked at Annabeth. "I gotta get this," he said apologetically, "don't drink my beer."

"I can't make any promises."

Percy rolled his eyes and walked to his room, shutting the door and making sure Annabeth couldn't hear him. "What's up, Chiron?"

"Two of them. Two Mechanics, Percy, that's all they have!"

"What?" he asked, confused.

Chiron took a deep breath. "Sorry," he murmured, "I'm just a little excited. But our Analysts in Russia took down a gang of Mechanics in a bar in Saint Petersburg. Fourteen, to be exact. Now there are only two left."

Percy nodded. "And just my fucking luck that they're coming after Rachel and Annabeth."

"Ahh...yes, that was the other thing. They're in Manhattan."

"WHAT?!"

"Now," said Chiron, "don't get too overworked- Manhattan is a part of one the largest and most popular cities on earth. For all we know, the last two Mechanics have apartments here. But what it means is that you and Nico need to keep your guard up. Don't go after them yet, because we aren't sure if they know where the girls are, and a pursuit will just tip them off. Just lay low and do your job."

Percy nodded. "All right. Thanks, Chiron."

He slipped his phone back into his pocket, heading out the door to his dorm room where he found Annabeth downing the last of their beers. "I thought I told you not to drink my beer?"

Annabeth, one of those people who could drink a lot and stay sober, wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and shrugged. "And I thought I told you I couldn't make any promises."

He rolled his eyes as he shrugged on his jacket. "I'll be back in a minute," he said, throwing the door open and stepping out, taking the elevator to Nico's dorm. His cousin needed to hear the news.

Percy caught Nico just as he stepped out of the dorm he shared with Rachel. Nico's eyes widened upon seeing Percy, and he exclaimed, "Hey- did you hear the news?"

Percy nodded. "Two Mechanics left. And just our luck, they're coming for Annabeth and Rachel."

They stood around in a slightly awkward silence before Nico shrugged and turned back to his dorm. "Well, see y-"

Nico's sentence was cut short by the sound of glass shattering. And it was coming from his dorm.

Instantly, the two Analysts were in the room, eyes wild. They saw figure in dark clothes cover Rachel's screaming mouth with his hand as he jumped out the window and out of sight.

"Shit!" Nico cursed, running to the window and looking down. The man, with Rachel still kicking and screaming, was sliding down a rope to a car on the ground floor, almost two stories below.

Nico turned to Percy. "We have to get Annabeth!" he said, "the way the guy's going, he'll end up right outside your dorm!"

Percy stared out the window for a moment and made a split-second decision, jerking Nico away from the window and out the door, into the hallway. "Come on!"

"What the hell are you doing? We need to save Annabeth!"

Percy shook his head. "If she's gone, there isn't anything we can do, and if she isn't gone, either she will be or we won't be able to save Rachel!" He wrenched open the door leading up to the room and started to scramble up the stairs. "Come on!"

Slightly bewildered, Nico followed Percy, scampering up seven flights of stairs. "Why are we going to the fucking _roof_?"

Percy shoved a backpack into Nico's arms. " Put it on!" he commanded.

At a confused look from his partner, he shouted, "I don't have time to explain it right now!" He slung a backpack over his shoulders, watching as Nico put on his. He grabbed two guns out of the closet he got the backpack from and tossed one of the pistols to Nico. "At all the places we have long-term missions, emergency packs like these are stationed on the roof!"

He darted to the edge of the roof and looked down. He saw the two Mechanics get into the car, with the two prisoners with them. The sight of Annabeth, limp in the second assassin's arms, sent a flare of anger down his spine, but that was covered by the miraculous appearance of a truck with a wooden crate on it's back, filled with pillows, that was trailing right behind the Mechanics' car.

Probably the only lucky break he'd had since he met Annabeth.

He whirled around to face Nico, pointing in the general direction of the pillow truck. "Jump!"

Nico's eyes widened as he slipped his gun into his pocket and adjusted the straps of his backpack. "Are you fucking _insane?"_

It would take a while to convince Nico, so Percy took the road less traveled. He grabbed Nico by the shirt and shoved him over the edge. "Have fun!" And he watched as Nico plummeted dozens of feet down into the pillow truck.

Percy took a deep breath, adjusted his angle of trajectory to fit the moving trucks, and made a cross on his body, praying to whatever gods were out there.

"Fuck life," he muttered in a singsong, nursery rhyme voice, as he jumped off the building.

* * *

**A/N:** I know that may have been more of a filler to you guys, but I loved writing it! This chapter was probably my favorite one to write!

I think I liked my portrayal of Percy- who says girls are the only lovestruck, head-over-heels people in this world?

Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

**-epicsilverbullet**


	8. Chapter 8

**A/N:** Hi guys! Thanks for all of the awesome reviews!

So, I was watching Collateral -great movie, by the way, because everybody watches R-rated movies when their parents aren't home for three hours- and the idea for this chapter just popped into my mind. So, thanks to Tom Cruise, Jamis Foxx, Mark Ruffalo, and Jason Statham!

This chapter was also influenced by me watching Skyfall, the next James Bond movie. Does anyone besides me think that Daniel Craig is the yummiest actor since Channing Tatum and Ryan Gosling?

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO, Skyfall, or Collateral

* * *

"Did it go well?"

"It got done."

Chief McKenna raised an eyebrow. "You know that's not what I like to hear."

Luke Castellan remained stony faced, but inside, he gulped nervously. The piercing gold eyes of Chief McKenna (which probably wasn't even his real name) bore straight through him. "It was Dean, Chief. It seemed a little...impractical to kill him after how long I have known him. It was also a shock to learn that he wasn't one of the bosses."

"And you did not believe me when I told you that very same thing after the Percy Jackson mission?"

Luke gulped. And the Chief noticed.

The Chief raised an eyebrow and chuckled to himself as they turned left down the hallway. "Interesting..." he mused, "you aren't going soft, not yet. Maybe you've got so much shit up in your head you don't know what to do with it. Good thing you've got an apprentice, isn't it?"

Luke blinked. "An apprentice?"

Chief McKenna chuckled again. "Don't worry," he said throwing open the door to his office, "I'm sure you'll find Mr. Nakamura...more than capable of the job."

* * *

The man with the black hair and the crossed arms stood next to the man with the blonde hair and blue eyes. "This is the first one?"

Luke nodded. "First of three we've got all day to do. Should get you more than ready for the big job."

Without warning, he turned to Ethan Nakamura and handed him a silenced Uzi, the likes of which Ethan had never heard before. "If I tell you to point this bitch at my head and pull the trigger, would you do it?"

Ethan blinked. "But...aren't you supposed to-"

"Do it!" Luke hissed.

Without hesitation, Ethan pulled the gun up, held it up a few inches in front of Luke's forehead, and pulled the trigger.

A wad of cardboard fell out, and, rather ungracefully, swirled around in the air before falling to the floor.

Luke smiled, a cold, evil smile. "You're ready."

He took the gun from his apprentice. "If you forget everything else you've ever learned in life, remember these steps: Load the gun, cock it, silence it, and shoot. Easy. But it can be the difference between completing the job successfully and getting caught by the cops."

He loaded a mag into the gun, cocked it, silenced it, and took the shot.

That time, cardboard didn't fall out.

* * *

"There are some jobs," Luke was explaining as they walked down Broadway, "that need to look like accidents. People start dropping like flies, the NYPD is gonna start to get suspicious."

Ethan nodded in agreement, taking it all in. "But," Luke continued, "bunch of people start, ah, "committing suicide", if you get my drift, or anything else like that- they don't give a shit. People do that everyday. Accidents happen."

A bus came by them, and the two assassins got on it, along with a man in a long black overcoat carrying a briefcase. The Mechanics sat in the seat behind and diagonal to the man.

"X-ray," Luke whispered, and the two flicked a tiny switch on their sunglasses, looking into the man's briefcase. They were greeted by packets of marijuana.

Luke whistled. "If it makes you feel better, this guy's a real criminal. Not an innocent. Runs a drug dealership down in Belize."

Ethan raised an eyebrow. "The fuck do you know that?"

Luke grinned and showed Ethan his computer- scratch that, it wasn't a computer. It looked like an iPad, yet smaller, so it was portable, but it also had a USB port in the side. "Every time you get a mission, you stick the USB in the port and key in your name. The details of your job are uploaded, and the keyboard is fingerprint coded so no one but you can log into your "account", so to speak."

Ethan nodded slowly. "How are we supposed to nab this guy, though?" he inquired, "the bus driver will notice if we shoot him, even with a silencer."

Luke's grin got wider. He reached into his pocket, flicking open a black-handled switchblade. "Some jobs don't need guns. How does a fatal heart wound sound? People fall onto knives every day on wobbly buses."

* * *

Ethan had never like dark, deserted alleyways. They usually housed rats, and he had a death fear of the little vermins.

The pair of them were leaning against the side of a building, waiting for the target to come. The person they were supposed to be eliminating believed that the Mechanics were dealers, and were going to hand him some joints.

Was he in for a surprise.

So was Ethan, it seemed. Luke turned to him and handed him the Uzi. "I want you to take this one."

Ethan blinked. "Me? Isn't my first job supposed to be an unimportant, practice mission?"

Luke shook his head and smiled. "The best way to improve is actual work." He pointed down the alley, where a figure, masked by the darkness of Manhattan at night, was making his way towards them. "And you'll have to get ready. Remember the steps?"

Ethan took a deep breath, running through the steps in his mind. He loaded the mag and cocked the pistol. He was actually a little nervous, as that was his first actual job. So nervous, actually, that he forgot probably the most important part. The silencer.

The target got close to them, exhaling cigarette smoke in rings. "I hear you got the goods for me?"

Without talking, Ethan pulled the gun out, aimed it at the guy's head, and pulled the trigger.

_BANG!_

With a resounding noise, the gun went off, and the target went down, a red hole appearing right in the middle of his forehead.

Unfortunately, there was a gang of thugs passing by the alleyway where the two Mechanics were, and they rushed towards Luke and Ethan.

One of them, who Ethan assumed was the leader, stared, wide-eyed at the body on the ground. "What the f-"

And then the gun was out of Ethan's hand and into Luke's, and with five more bangs, the whole gang was on the ground. Dead. Holes, either in the center of their stomachs or the center of their foreheads, oozing red blood.

Luke turned to Ethan, breathing hard. "Another lesson. Remember the silencer. Otherwise, people get killed who don't need to be killed."

Ethan just nodded, and Luke turned away from him, breaking eye contact and pocketing the gun.

Perhaps Mechanics felt emotions, too.

* * *

_Three days later..._

Luke pressed the earpiece into his ear. "What?"

Chief McKenna's voice crackled over the speaker. "Another mission. Both you and Ethan." And the line went dead. The Chief never was one for excessive conversation, nor was he one for communicating over the telephone, as that could easily be tapped by pretty much anyone.

Luke, however, didn't have many qualms about that. In seconds, he had Ethan on the phone. "We've got another job," he said, "check your tablet."

He could hear rustling sounds, which were probably Ethan firing up the tablet, and then he heard his apprentice's voice over the phone.

"What are Analysts?"

* * *

**A/N: **I just felt like something like this needed to be done. Kudos to you if you get the Collateral reference! Even bigger Kudos to you if you get the Skyfall kinda-reference!

And, in case you didn't know, this is a pre-story thing, except for the last little snippet, which occurs probably around the time Percy and Nico first meet Annabeth and Rachel.

**IMPORTANT IMPORTANT IMPORTANT!**

I'll be on vacation in Tennessee for Thanksgiving from Tuesday to Friday, so I won't be able to update then. However, I updated my House of Hades story, and I'll to squeeze out a chapter for The Gods Must Be Crazy, but no promises. Okay?

Until then, reviews would be greatly appreciated!

**-epicsilverbullet**


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Notes:** I realize now that I haven't updated this story in a while, and after watching:

1) Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol

2) The Hurt Locker

and

3) Skyfall

yesterday, my action movie inspiration is now officially back, along with my full inspiration for this story! Hope you enjoy!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO

* * *

The life of an Analyst, Nico realized, was a lot harder than it had seemed when he'd first heard about it. He probably should have read the "Requirements" section of the job application, if one of those even...existed. For the job of assassin protection.

Life could have been worse, though- yes, they jumped of a building, but they happened to land in a pillow truck, which only happened in old 60s cartoons or terribly written stories, and as far as he knew, he and his older cousin didn't fit into any one of those categories.

Speaking of older cousins, Percy was rummaging around in his bag, looking for something. Or maybe he was confirming something- he kept nodding and saying things like, "Yeah. Yup. Good. Uh-huh."

Nico raised an eyebrow. "What's up?"

Percy jerked his thumb back at the terrain. "This is a miracle, that our truck is still tailing the car. And if there's one fucking thing you learn about miracles, it's that they don't last. The car is most likely going to some deserted farmhouse or something, which is a good place to hold a hostage, and the truck is probably going to some factory, so we'll need our own way to follow the Mechanics. Last time I checked, the best place to hold a hostage isn't close to a factory or any other degree of civilization."

It was a lot to take in for Nico, who'd been riding mainly on an adrenaline high for the past while. "Uh...yeah." A pause. "How do we do that?"

Percy smirked. "You ever played on one of those old-fashioned joystick things?"

Nico nodded. "Yeah. You move it forward to go forward, left to go left, right to go right-"

Percy nodded, slipping his backpack over his shoulders. "Well, I hope you were good at those games. Suit up, there are jet packs built into these bags."

Nico's eyes bulged out of his face. "J-jet packs?"

Percy rolled his eyes as Nico got into his backpack. Around halfway down the left strap, there was a small black button. Percy hit it on both of their bags, and a small control pad retracted out of the top of Nico's bag, from his right shoulder blade strap. There was a joystick, a blue button, and a red button on the pad.

"Quick crash course," Percy said, "red to start. Pull up on the stick to go up, and down to go down. Push it from side to side to steer. Red to stop again. Got it?"

Nico was staring at the control panel like it was Megan Fox in a bikini.

Percy rolled his eyes, taking out two small earpieces from his pocket and jamming one of them into his left ear. "These will help us stay in contact with each other even when we aren't close."

Nico took one from Percy, getting over his jet pack high and jamming the earpiece into his left ear. "Next thing, you'll be telling me we can turn invisible," he joked.

Percy stared at him.

Nico gulped. "Um, we can't, right?"

Percy smirked. "The government hides a lot of stuff from it's citizens." He opened what looked like a regular water bottle, dousing himself with it and pouring the rest over his cousin.

"What the _hell, _man?"

Percy sighed. "The water is mixed with a special fluid created by the guys at intel. The fluid contains tiny microbes that, when commanded, each turn on their reflective capabilities, shooting light back in every direction like it normally would, yet never allowing light to touch you, rendering you unable to be seen or detected by camera."

"Uh..." said Nico,"English, please?"

Percy rolled his eyes. "Tiny robots in the water make you invisible. Hit the blue button to activate it."

Nico nodded, looking around at everything. "Got it. So...the backpack is full of gadgets like this?"

Percy grinned. "Yup. They'll make it easier to complete our mission."

Nico blinked. "Mission? Aren't we just saving the girls?"

Percy shook his head. "Save the girls, tell them about Analysts, arrest Mechanics. That's our mission. Hell, when you have the job I do,even taking a leak in the middle of the night becomes a mission."

"Taking a leak in the middle of the night?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

"But what could possibly-"

"I _said_, I don't want to talk about it."

Nico looked around uncomfortably, feeling unusually warm and dry even though he was doused by water. "So...we just go?"

Percy was nowhere to be found.

Nico squinted. "Uh...Percy?"

Percy's voice came out of nowhere. "Activate invisibility, you idiot, so we can fly out of here!"

"Oh," said Nico, feeling stupid, "right." And he pushed the blue button.

Immediately, he disappeared. Not from his own view, but from everyone else's.

"That...that's it?" he said to the area Percy was in. "It just...happens?"

"Well, yeah. What were you expecting?"

Nico sighed. "Never mind. So when we're flying, how do we not ram into each other at Mach Twelve?"

"The microbes will sense other microbes adhering to a foreign surface and alert you with vibrations that will tell you to fly away. If you don't respond within the designated time slot, they'll scan the outside information and pick the best evasion route. It's pretty much foolproof."

If Nico could have just stared at Percy uncomprehendingly, he would have. He gave it his best shot, though.

Percy sighed irritably. "The robots will tell you if you're about to die. Now come on, push the button."

Nico stared down at the rest of his body, which, somehow, he could see. "How can I see myself?"

"Do you really want me to explain it to you? Just push the damn button so we can get out of here."

"Uh... the big, red button?"

"Yeah. What other red button do you see?"

"Well, it's just that, in all the action movies...big, red, buttons are never meant to be pressed. They're usually self-destruct, or something like that. So I'd rather not-"

"PUSH THE BUTTON!"

And somehow, Nico could tell that Percy had done it. Of course, his older cousin was still yelling at him in his ear, thanks to the earpiece, but he was gone. It was up to Nico to push the big, red, button.

Going against everything he believed, everything his instincts and Tom Cruise told him, he pushed the big, red, button.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Hope you liked that! Definitely a lot more to come from this story.

I probably could have continued this chapter to when Nico takes off, but I felt that it stood alone better if I didn't continue it, so I stopped there. Hope you like!

Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

**-epicsilverbullet**


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Notes:** Happy New Year!

By the way, I did update my House of Hades story. I don't know if nobody's checked yet, or if they checked but haven't noticed, or what happened. But just so you know, chapter six is posted.

Sorry this chapter took a while to come out. But it is kinda longer than the other ones, and is absolutely necessary to the procedure of the story.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO

* * *

Instantly, he shot into the air, spiraling out of control and screaming at the top of his lungs. He didn't know which way was up, where he was, where he was going, but he could hear Percy yelling at him in his ear through his earpiece.

"Nico, you're going to hit a tree!"

What?

He opened his eyes and realized that he was flying straight, actually parallel to the truck, where he was supposed to be flying, but a little off the road and in a forest- it was pure dumb luck that he hadn't hit a tree already, but he was zooming straight for one, and it was a big one.

His brain shut down, and he thought, _Oh, this is going to hurt._ And then impact came. From the left.

What?

"I got you!" said Percy in Nico's earpiece, plucking him out of the sky and away from danger moments before certain death. "You gotta learn how to fly this thing, Nico, because I can't be saving your ass all the time!"

"How _do _you fly this thing?"

"I told you. Up for up, down for down, left for left, right for right."

Nico gulped again as Percy shimmered into view. "And it works?"

Percy rolled his eyes. "That's why I'm not dead right know."

"How can I see you?"

Percy grinned. "Ah, it's kicked in for you?"

"Yeah."

"It's complicated- has a lot to do with science and light and the electromagnetic spectrum, but what's basically happening is this: we're not changing ourselves to be invisible, we're just distorting everyone else's view."

Nico shrugged, as best as he could in midair. "That's more legit than some things that have happened to me int he past few weeks."

And he realized he was flying. By himself. Without Percy's aid. It didn't feel much different from walking and running, except for the fact that it was abnormally windy. But it was cool, too.

He looked down at the road and noticed the pillow truck and the kidnapper's car split up at a fork in the road. "Good thing we left the truck," he said into his earpiece to his colleague.

Percy nodded. "While you were going crazy, I bugged their car with a recording device, heard all I needed to know, and then remotely detonated it."

He was far away from where Nico was flying, but Nico could envision a smirk creeping up on his face.

"Have you ever heard of Atlantic City?"

* * *

They tailed the car in their jet packs up until they found where it was heading- a mansion on the beach in the casino capital of America.

"Not good," Percy had said, "for two reasons. One, I recognize that as the Mechanic's stronghold, meaning the last two assassins are there, along with their boss. They're all in one place, but we can't simply blow up the building. It's on a public beach, and Jersey's legal eagles would be all over my ass."

"What?" Nico had said. "So what we're doing isn't legal?"

They landed in the parking lot of a hotel right across the street from the mansion, using money from the backpack to book a suite on the fifteenth floor of the five-star building, and after a quick dinner, they went back up to the suite to formulate a plan.

"Divide and conquer," said Percy, "that's our plan. We take them out- meaning arrest them- one at a time. First up is the boss, a man by the name of Kronos."

"His name is Kronos?" Nico inquired. "Like the ancient Greek Titan?"

"Actually, his name is Dennis. But since that doesn't exactly strike fear into the hearts of...of well, anybody, he goes by Kronos."

Nico nodded. "How do you know all this?"

In response, Percy tossed a manila envelope across the table. "We've got a file on him, we've got a file on everyone who's a threat. Read up, because we take him out tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?"

"Today is Tuesday. Wednesday is his gambling day. He goes to the casino- the one on the ground floor of this hotel, the one we're staying in- and plays seven hours of blackjack. That's our golden opportunity to get him." He put his hands on the table and stared into Nico's eyes. "Phase One. Take out Kronos's bodyguards and infiltrate his system with knockout serum. Allow me to explain.

"You're insane," Nico said before Percy could start, his three-day James Bond marathon finally coming in handy. "He'll have guards. And they'll most likely be undercover. At the first sign of hostility, they'll just kill us."

Percy smirked. "Exactly. Which is why there won't be any hostility until later."

He brought out a small handheld device from his pocket and booted it up. "This little gold mine comes in handy for displaying missions. It's like an iPad or tablet, similar to the ones the Mechanics use. I'll explain it to you later."

"The Mechanics use it? Does that mean it's commercially available?" Nico asked.

Percy nodded. "Every Tom, Dick, and Osama Bin Laden can get one if they had a couple thousand bucks." He turned his attention back to the handheld, which was about the size and shape of a small iPad. It currently showed a 3-D floor plan of the entire hotel that seemed to project out of the device and in front of them. Percy hit a button and the entire building was filled with people. "A simulation of what it's going to be like in two days. Based on photographs that were taken from surveillance cameras."

He zoomed into the ground floor, where people were frozen in mid-action. He tapped one person at the blackjack table and the picture zoomed in further. The man in question was intimidating-looking, with cold, black eyes and hair. His facial expression wasn't that of a human being, but of a lion examining his prey from a distance, wondering what was the best way to dispose of it.

"Hard to believe his parents chose the name Dennis," Nico noted.

Percy shrugged. "Yeah, well. So this guy just plays for hours on end- seven hours was the max, but it's definitely a couple hours, which is long enough for him to be taken out. That's where you come in." He looked at Nico. "You play blackjack?"

Nico shrugged. "Used to."

Percy grinned. "Excellent, because I suck."

"Wait a minute. I never said I was _good_ at-"

"Timing is everything," Percy interrupted. "A dealer for blackjack is chosen when the casino opens. And you know how the dealer controls the game- the very game that Kronos loves to play."

"I have to be the dealer," Nico guessed.

Percy shook his head. "The casino opens at noon, and they have a 'winner stays on' policy. Basically, whoever wins the game, regardless of if they're the dealer or not, automatically becomes the dealer. If you keep winning, five, six, seven times in a row, you remain dealer. And that's crucial to your part of the plan."

He reached into the backpack he brought from the hotel and produced a small vial filled with a few milliliters of liquid. "Powerful knockout serum," he said. "It only goes into effect when we tell it to, because the particles are actually tiny machines than attack parts of the body- similar to the invisibility liquid in the water. It doesn't have any side effects, except for a headache when the person wakes up, but he'll be out for four or five hours when it's put into effect. Which should be enough time to initiate Phase Two." He paused. "Any questions on Phase One?"

Nico stared at the handheld, bewildered and overwhelmed. "When did you come up with this?"

Percy shrugged. "On the flight here."

"You call that a flight?"

"Yes, of sorts. Any other questions?"

Nico sighed. "What about the guards?"

"That's where I come in." He fished out a small syringe from his pack and held it up. "Same knockout serum, except the effect is instantaneous. I'll use this to take out the guards."

"How do you know who the guards are?"

Percy gave him a weird look. "Like I said: we keep files on everyone who's a threat. Bodyguards count, in fact, they're usually the most dangerous and the most watched. And this is why I'm the one taking them out, unless you want to memorize their names, faces, personalities, et cetera. And don't worry about how I'll dispose of them to make sure no one finds out. I'm very good at what I do, and they won't die."

"And how exactly do I give Kronos the serum?"

"Let me give you a scenario," Percy answered. "You're playing blackjack. When Kronos enters the casino, that's when you try to win the next round. When you win-"

"If."

"_When_," Percy corrected. "Losing is not an option. There are lives at stake, remember."

_Annabeth and Rachel_, Nico thought. "Go on."

"When you win," Percy continued, "you have to keep winning until Kronos comes over and gets into the game. It isn't too complicated, though- just make sure you're the dealer for at least one of Kronos's games."

"And how will being the dealer help me?"

"You get to control giving the cards away. Kronos always sits on the seat right to the left of the dealer- he sometimes gets a sneak peek at the cards- but you know he'll be the first one to get the card. So you hide the serum up your sleeve. Then what you do is you pretend to drop the deck of cards. While you get down on the floor to pick them up, lace the top card with the knockout serum. Dump it all on the card. Then give it to Kronos."

"So he'll get the full effects of the serum," Nico said, "and I have to make sure not to touch it."

Percy nodded. "Yeah. After you've done that, your part of Phase One is basically over. Purposely lose that round, the one where you drug Kronos, and head back to the room with the drugged card to initiate Phase Two. We'll get to that later."

Nico nodded. "I mean, it _seems_ legit...but how do I make sure Kronos doesn't see me doing it? Lacing the card, I mean?"

Percy shrugged. "I'll cause a distraction. We'll be wearing earpieces that allow us to communicate with each other, so when you want Kronos to look away, just give me a shout and I'll get him to look away."

He ejected the flash drive that Nico just realized was in the handheld and put in another one. This time, the image that popped up was of a suite in the hotel.

"Phase Two. Top floor penthouse suite," Percy said. "is where Kronos stays. See, the serum has two different stages, designed specifically for the kind of job. Stage one is wooziness and nausea. It'll make him go up to his room and lie down. When he's alone in his room, I knock him out and we start Phase Two."

"Which is?"

"Simpler than Phase One," Percy answered. "You hang tight in the room. Meanwhile, I'll go up to Kronos's floor, tranq the bodyguards that are outside his room, and give you a shout. You'll- and stay with me, here- you'll grab the jet packs, fly out of our window and up to the penthouse's window. Smash that window, toss me a jet pack, and we'll fly out with Kronos back to headquarters. And come back before sunrise for Ethan and Luke."

"I assume you've got a plan for them, too?"

Percy shrugged. "Working on it. Right now, my main worry is Kronos. He's the big fish, the Gran Poobah of the Mechanics. It's smart to take him out first. Then the Mechanics have no leader."

"And are you..." Nico hesitated, "...sure this will work?"

Percy nodded. "It'll happen. Like I said, I've done this before, this is what I do."

He checked the clock. "It's getting late. You should get to bed, tomorrow we've got phase one."

Nico sighed. "Yeah. I'll get to bed."

Percy passed him on the way to his bedroom and stopped, turning back to his cousin. "Hey," he said.

"What?"

Percy hesitated for a second. "You'll be fine. I've done this before. The one really is that you make sure you don't touch any of the serum. If you do, you'll be affected when I activate it. And then I'll have two people to save and no one to help me do it. Understand?"

Nico nodded. "And what about if we get attacked?"

"At what point?"

"Whenever."

Percy shrugged. "Worst-case-scenario, we get caught with all our weapons. Then the FBI will cover for us. I'll keep the instant serum with me, of course, and a tranquilizer gun for the bodyguards. Do you need anything besides the manually-controlled serum?"

Nico shook his head. "We're just two regular guys out for a night of gambling and drinking, man, I don't know what you're talking about."

Percy smiled and clapped him on the shoulder. "That's the right way of thinking."

* * *

Lying in bed, Nico weighed his strengths and weaknesses against what his part of the mission required him to do, and he felt pretty good about it. But he still wasn't quite sure that it would actually succeed. It seemed more far-fetched than pretty much anything he'd ever heard in his life.

It got to the point that he found himself dialing Chiron's office number on the phone the Analysts had provided for him. After a few rings, the leader of his operation picked up.

"Yeah?"

"Chiron? It's Nico."

"Nico? What's the problem? Is there one?"

"You know about our mission, of course."

"Yeah. Percy sent me the details a few hours ago."

"Do you think it's plausible?"

"You mean, that it could work?"

"Yeah."

Chiron drew in a long breath and slowly let it out. "I don't know," he finally said. "I really don't."

"Percy does."

"And with good reason. Exfils are his passion, his specialty."

"Exfils?"

"Exfiltrations. As opposed to infiltrations. Getting someone out of somewhere instead of putting someone in. Like in Argo, with Ben Affleck."

"Yeah, I saw it. Did you?"

"Yes. It was pretty good."

"Did you also happen to notice that it was the most insanely hard and improbable thing that has ever happened?"

"But it happened."

"I mean- I don't know, Chiron."

"Trust Percy. He's been doing this for a while. This is what he does, and he's very good at it. Probably the best."

Nico felt his eyelids getting heavier. Chiron's reassurance's had the effect of a soothing lullaby on him. "Thanks, Chiron," he said.

He could hear the smile in Chiron's words. "No problem."

He put the phone down on his side table and fell asleep to dreams of all the ways phase one and phase two could go wrong.

And all the ways he'd fix them.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** That chapter was pretty fun to write. Coming up with plans and strategies and stuff like that is always fun. And the writing of phase one and phase two will be even more fun.

Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

**-epicsilverbullet**


	11. Chapter 11

**Author's ****Notes:** And here we go. Parts one and two of the two-part phase in which Percy and Nico take down Kronos.

I mention blackjack in this chapter. If you don't know what blackjack is, all you need to know that basically you get dealt cards until you get as close as you can to 21. Number cards have face value (a 9 is 9 points, a 6 is 6 points, etc), face cards (jacks, queens, kings) are worth ten points each, and aces can be either one point or eleven.

I originally planned to separate it into two parts, phase one and phase two, but phase two was too short, so I just condensed it into one. It is long, but it is also necessary.

Enjoy.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO

* * *

Nico still had some questions on the the long elevator ride down.

"Back in New York," he began.

Percy fidgeted with his Armani suit and turned to his colleague. "What?"

"Our first mission. The one where we were jogging."

"Oh. What about it?"

"How did you...I mean, why did you run up to the elevator that time and sneak up to that guy's room? How did you know that something was up?"

"Oh," he said. "Well, we saw through x-ray that the Mechanic was riding up the elevator. I was going to freeze the elevator, but then I noticed that he wasn't moving at all and the heat sensor wasn't giving me anything. I acted upon the hunch that it was just a dummy of some sort and the real Mechanic found some other way up."

Nico stared straight ahead at his reflection. "Oh. And if your hunch was wrong?"

"Plan C."

"Which is?"

"We blow it up."

He pushed the earpiece a little farther into his ear as the elevator doors dinged open, and the two men in suits stepped out into the casino.

"Remember," Percy said. "Be subtle. No one should know we're here."

Nico took a deep breath and nodded. "You got the guards? You're sure?"

Percy grinned and nodded back. "It's show time."

**...**

Percy walked over to the bar and ordered a martini. There were some women looking at him, but he ignored them, choosing instead to focus on the task at hand.

Nico had already made his way over to the blackjack table and their game seemed to already be starting. He looked fine, maybe a little nervous, but he'd get through it.

Percy scanned the room for potential bodyguards. Over his years of doing this, the one common trait all bodyguards had had was that they were so tense. This was because they had to be prepared to attack at any minute, but it also gave people like him dead giveaways as to who the bodyguards could be.

He located two such people around the room. A low number, especially for someone like Kronos, but the Mechanics essentially didn't know that he and Nico knew about who did the kidnapping, and even if they did know that they knew, they wouldn't be expecting him to know where they were.

Percy let the hidden syringe slip out of his sleeve a little and then placed the unfinished martini on the bar table. He started walking to the first guard.

...

Nico was nervous as he approached the table but tried not to show it. "Mind if I join in?" he asked, noticing that Kronos had just arrived at the casino.

He looked over at Percy, who was casually sipping a martini at the bar. His relaxed posture seemed to be taunting Nico. Anger flared up inside of him, and he accepted the subliminal challenge Percy was sending him.

The final bet was a thousand bucks. The money was provided to him by the government.

The dealer dealed.

His first two cards were a seven and an ace, which weren't too bad. The seven wasn't too low, so it wouldn't take him too long to get up to twenty-one, and not so high that an eight or above would completely screw him over. The ace was especially useful because of its versatility, as it could count for either one point or eleven points.

Nico was third in the rotation. The first person after the dealer chose to hit. The second chose to stand.

He slyly looked at his cards again. Could be either an eight or an eighteen. What was the risk?

"Hit," he said when the dealer looked at him.

He got a four. Twenty-two or twelve. So close.

Everyone else chose to hit. Two of them busted, at thirty-two and twenty-seven. Nico wasn't too good at counting cards, but he deduced that the ratio of cards with low numbers to cards with high numbers was pretty high. The odds of him getting a low card were good, and a low card was what he needed.

The first guy hit and busted. The second guy stood. Nico debated it for a little while, then chose to hit.

A two. Ten or twenty.

Two rounds later, with Nico standing on both rounds, the dealer stopped with a score of nineteen.

There was a lot of cursing and complaining around the table as the rest of the players uncovered their hands. Three of the remaining five (of those who hadn't busted) had scores of nineteen. One had a score of eighteen. Nico was the only one who had a score of twenty, the only one whose score was higher than the dealers. He ended up winning nine thousand dollars, a spot in the dealer's chair, and eight enemies.

He scanned the room for Percy. His colleague was nowhere to be seen.

...

The first man was brooding in the corner of the room, sipping a glass of wine. Percy knew that he couldn't subtly sneak up on the guy and stab him with the immediate effect syringe, so he grabbed two glasses of champagne off of a waiter's tray, downed both of them in two gulps, and pretended to be drunk as he stumbled his way over to the guy.

He wasn't drunk. One of the training regimens for Analysts was to get their alcohol tolerance up, because one never knew when they'd have to use it.

"Hey, mister," he said, grabbing onto the wall for support as he approached the Mechanic. "I don't suppose you got a smoke?"

The bodyguard regarded him coldly. "No," he said, "I don't smoke."

Percy glared at him. "Well then," he said, "I hope you get hit!" He smiled proudly. "Yeah, that's right! By an airplane! And a horse too!"

He swung a fist at the bodyguard, pretending to be in a drunken rage. The guard easily caught his fist, but Percy let the syringe drop into the palm of his hand. It slipped through his fingers and pierced the wrist of the bodyguard.

The hulking protector was experienced enough to try and reach for his pocket, where a distress call could be sent out before unconsciousness took over him, but Percy grabbed onto the guy's arms and steadied him as he went down. He casually brought the curtain down from the window right next to them, covered the body, and nudged it with his foot over to a stack of carpets and paint cans so it looked like part of the materials.

One down. One to go.

The lowe number still bothered him.

That was when Nico's voice came over the loudspeaker.

"I won. The distraction can happen now."

...

Nico took his hand off his ear and nervously looked around to check if anyone had seem him talking to Percy. He didn't think anyone had.

Kronos made his way over to the table and sat down in the seat right next to Nico, which was _extremely_ intimidating.

He smiled at Nico, a cold, evil smile. "Evening."

Nico took a metaphorical deep breath and smiled back, expertly shuffling the cards. "Same to you," he said, "you'll be playing the next round?"

Kronos nodded. "I hope to give you a run for your money, speaking of which, what would the starting bet-"

And then a loud _bang_ sounded from the poker table.

"I WILL NOT HAVE IT!"

Nico dropped the cards, not on purpose, like they'd planned, but by accident, as a reaction to the sound.

He dropped down to the floor, and in one fluid motion, let the vial fall into his hand as he uncapped it and let the liquid fall onto one card.

Making sure not to touch the card in question, he gathered up the pile and set the stack neatly down on the table. "Sorry," he apologized to Kronos. "That just scared me a bit."

Kronos nodded, not really paying attention. Nico noticed him scanning the room, probably looking for the bodyguards that Percy disposed of.

"Sir?" Nico said, snapping Kronos back to attention. "Are you ready to play?" He gestured to the rest of the table, to the waiting players.

Kronos stared at him for a second. "Yeah," he said. "Yeah, sure. Let's start."

Nico nodded. "Thanks," he said, both to Kronos and Percy.

He dealt the first set of cards to the players. Kronos picked up his two cards. The serum would now be all over his hand, seeping through into his system, and it would only take one push of one button to knock him out.

...

Percy casually strolled through the crowd. He kept one hand on his ear, talking in a low voice to Nico as he walked towards the next bodyguard.

"The distraction good enough?"

"Yeah." A faint whisper. Nico couldn't risk anyone hearing him.

"Alright. Never too hard to rile up a rich, white guy when you steal his chips and stuff 'em down his pants. The bang was his gun. He shot me with a piece of cardboard."

"I can't talk much right now."

"Right. I'll do the talking. Lose this game, then ditch and go to the room. I'll take care of everything else. Just be ready to fly."

Nico didn't answer.

I'll get the bodyguards, too."

Nico didn't answer.

Percy sighed. "Breath once for 'Got it' and twice for 'What the hell are you talking about?'"

Nico breathed twice.

Percy casually walked by the second bodyguard, who was drinking a glass of wine and talking to a woman (inexperienced guy- distracted from the job) and casually bumped into him. "Excuse me," he said politely, making sure he retracted the syringe in and out of his hand as fast as he could.

The bodyguard looked at him and then fell to the ground, unconscious.

"Excuse me," Percy said, pushing past the woman the guard was with.

The woman snapped her head around to look for Percy, but he'd disappeared into the crowd.

...

Nico was still letting out his second breath when he'd finished dealing out the first round of cards.

"Excuse me," Percy said through the speaker. Nico assumed it was for someone else.

He locked eyes with Kronos. "Hit," he said, his golden eyes cold and evil.

Nico dealt him a card and checked his own pile. A two and an ace. A safe bet to keep on hitting.

Percy's voice came through the speaker in his ear. "Same code as before. One breath for 'got it', two for 'repeat.' Okay?"

Nico took a deep breath and exhaled once.

"Good. Now, you're going to lose this game."

Nico breathed. The next two people hit.

"After you lose the game, go to the room."

Nico coughed once so as not to arouse suspicion. Thankfully, Percy understood.

He shook his head. "Sorry," he said, and dealt another card.

"When you're at the room, wait for me to give you a shout, then grab the jet packs and fly up to the penthouse suite window. By that point, we're home free."

Nico exhaled deeply, pretending to think about what card he should get next.

"Good. See you in a few."

...

Percy frowned as he looked around the room. There were supposed to be four bodyguards, but there were only two. Where could the other ones be?

He spoke into his earpiece. "Only two here, Nico. I don't like it. There may be some more up at the penthouse, and if there are, I've got them."

One breath. Confirmation.

He hung around by the bar until he saw that Nico had lost the game. Kronos, looking angry, stayed at the table, intent on winning his money back.

Percy smiled. "Not on my watch," he said, and he pushed the first button.

Even from a distance, Percy noticed an immediate change. Kronos broke out in a sweat and his face turned pale. He excused himself from the table and made his way over to the elevators, angrily cursing out the waiters serving the food, as if it was their fault.

"And he's on the move," Percy said. "I'll follow him up. You go to the room."

Percy and Nico passed each other en route to their separate elevators. Neither of them acknowledged the other's existence.

Percy was starting to feel really good about their chances of completing the mission, when a woman broke off from the party and started to accompany Kronos to the elevator. He didn't shake her off.

Percy swore. "Nico, don't go to the room!" he said. "Kronos has a girl. I'll get rid of her and take her to the room so she doesn't interfere, when I'm finished, that's when you make your move!"

"What?" Nico's voice came through his ear. "You're going to fuck her? This is hardly the time!"

"Maybe. Probably. I don't know, I'll think of something! Just hang around the bar until I give the word, then proceed as planned."

Nico sighed. "Sure. Yeah, whatever."

Percy quickened his pace until he was right behind the couple. Plans fired through his mind, and his impulsive brain quickly set to work on the one it deemed the best.

He accidently-on-purpose bumped into the girl, and she tripped. Percy caught her on the way down. He fumbled with the syringe and brought it down into his palm.

"Are you alright, ma'am?" he said to the girl in his arms. She was pretty.

She glared at Kronos. "Son of a bitch!" she yelled. "You tripped me!"

Kronos was too pale and tired to argue. He waved her off and got into an elevator. "Go to hell," he said, gasping for breath.

She huffed and stood up. "Thank you," she said, smoothing down her dress. "He can be kind of a pain sometimes." He could smell the alcohol on her breath.

Percy looked at for a second. "I am really, truly, sorry," he said.

He stabbed her in the neck with his syringe. She was down and out before she even knew she'd been stabbed.

Percy looked down at the body, and, knowing that the surveillance cameras would have picked that up, spoke one word into his microphone.

"Go."

**...**

"Go."

Nico downed the rest of his drink and pushed off from the bar.

He rode the elevator up to the fifteenth floor and entered his room.

Immediately, two people jumped onto his back and tackled him to the ground. One of them held him in a headlock while the other one slowly stood up and reached for his pocket. "Finish him!" yelled the one who had him in a headlock.

_The other two bodyguards!_ he thought. _Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!_

The one reaching for his pocket pulled out a gun, and Nico's body went into automatic.

He jerked his foot up and caught that guy in the crotch. His gun went flying. Nico planted his feet down on the ground then pushed off and up as hard as he could. The world flipped over, as did he, and he kicked the guy in the head who was holding him down. The assassin's grip on him loosened, and Nico squirmed free.

He hit the ground and rolled towards the tranquilizer gun on the couch. Thankfully, it was already loaded.

He picked it up and fired it at the guy who was reaching for the gun. The dart sank into his leg and he collapsed.

Unfortunately, the gun's recoil was massive, stronger than Nico had expected. The force tore the gun from his hands and sent it flying straight at the window. It crashed through the glass and fell fifteen stories to the ground. Nico hoped to god that no one was walking around on the sidewalk down there.

Weaponless, Nico dove for the gun that the first assassin was going for and came up shooting. Three shots went into the floor, but he righted himself at the last second and the final bullet went into the second guy's arm. He fell to the floor, yelling in pain.

That's when Percy's voice came through his earpiece.

"Come on up."

**...**

Percy had a fairly easy time getting up to Kronos's penthouse suite. He rode the elevator to the top floor and shot the lock to the door.

When he burst the door open and walked inside, Kronos looked up from the bed, his face pale and slick with sweat.

"You," he gasped for breath, "what are you doing here?"

Percy grinned. "I am an Analyst." He held up his remote control and put his finger over the green button. "At the casino today, your cards were laced with a powerful knockout serum. When I press this green button, you will be unconscious until and unless we want you to wake up." A little white lie, since the serum would only work for four hours, but little white lies never hurt anyone. "That's what you're feeling right now."

Kronos stared at him. "You're lying."

Percy continued. "When you wake up, you will be in federal custody. I hope you enjoy it."

Kronos lunged for Percy, his arms outstretched, but Percy hit the button and Kronos crumpled to the ground, unconscious.

He stared at the body for a second and then touched his ear.

"Come on up."

**...**

Nico didnt even think about anything he was doing. He strapped on one of the jet packs, picked up another, and then dove for the window.

The shock and pain of flying through a window encased him for a moment, and for that split second, he was free falling.

Then he grabbed the joystick and yanked up on it. His whole body jerked in the air and the second jet pack flew up and out of his hands. He maneuvered himself up and to the right, catching the second jet pack on the way to the penthouse suite.

Once he got up there, he tossed the jet pack he was carrying through the window, and a second later, Percy came barreling through the glass. Kronos was held aloft by a chain connected at one end through his shirt and at the other end to Percy's belt.

Nico made some small adjustments so that he was flying right next to Percy. "You good?"

Percy nodded and smiled. "Absolutely fantastic. Great job on your part, by the way." He looked right into the setting sun. "Fly that way for a while. We'll get there. We drop them off at headquarters and then come back here for the other two. I have a feeling I know what we're going to have to do."

They flew.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** Phew! That was long!

I hope you enjoyed that.

Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

I like on-line paragraphs.

Obviously.

Bye.

**-epicsilverbullet**


	12. Chapter 12

**Author's Notes:** I've lately been trying to get updates out quick since I've had, like, a month-long drought. Here's the next chapter- we're nearing the end of it, actually.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own PJO

* * *

They flew to headquarters.

They dropped off the leader of the assassins.

They flew back.

They cut the power to their jetpacks at just the right time so that they somersaulted through the air and through the window to their suite.

And he won a game of blackjack.

Five sentences Nico never thought he would be able to say.

Unfortunately, his exhilaration towards his accomplishments was short-lived. Percy was already slipping out of his dirty, ragged suit and into a fresh, clean one. "Hurry up!" he said, urging Nico on.

Nico looked at him for a second and shrugged out of his jetpack. "What are we doing?"

Percy hurriedly threw on a pair of pants. "The Mechanics always have an escape plan. A 'code red'. Whenever something goes wrong, they abandon ship and take control over a new ship. I found their 'code red' place as soon as we came here."

"How'd you do that?"

"I've done a lot of exfiltrations against these guys. It's started to become a gut feeling." He walked over to the window and pointed. Across the street, past the beach, and about ten yards from the dock, a large cruise ship was parked. "There's a party tonight. Exclusively for a certain set of people, but they'll let you in as long as you look sharp and have a lot of money. My guess is that they would have gone there anyways later and either killed the girls or...killed the girls." He looked uncomfortable.

Nico decided to change the subject. "When do they go? Night?"

Percy shook his head. "When they abandon ship, they abandon ship. They should be leaving now, actually. It's been seven hours- enough time for them to have been woken up, informed of the news, packed, and left. After the party's over, they'll hide somewhere on the ship, and by morning, they'll be gone. I checked the local shipping plans when we got here- that ship isn't going anywhere for a few weeks. By the time anyone notices they're missing, they'll be back at Mechanic headquarters, wherever that is."

"So what you're saying is that this may be the last chance," Nico said.

Percy nodded.

"What's the plan?"

"We sneak into the party. Plan A is for us to maroon the ship so they can't get anywhere." He reached into his bag and pulled out four chunks of clay, each no bigger than a Rubik's cube.

Nico looked closer. There were blue and yellow wires sticking out of them. That wasn't clay.

"Are those-"

"C4," Percy confirmed. "Two in the water, two on the ship. Your choice."

"I...the water." Nico didn't think his stealth skills were as honed as Percy's, and they would need good stealth skills in order to plant two charges on the ship without getting noticed.

Percy nodded and handed him two of the charges. "All you have do to is plant them. Rip the yellow wire out, stick one charge to the ship's steering rudder and one to the dock, then head back to this room. Try to go unnoticed. I'll meet you back there, and if you wait for fifteen minutes and I'm not there, detonate the charges." He pulled the detonator out of his bag and set it on the bed. "Got that?"

Nico slowly nodded his head. "I think so. What's Plan B?"

Percy sighed. "You don't get to know Plan B unless we need to use it. But remember to keep your objectives in mind- our main goal is to rescue the two kidnapped girls."

Nico had almost forgotten about that, what with all the capturing and turning in of assassins. The reminder brought on a new wave of anger that could be used as fuel.

"We do that," Percy continued, "by capturing the assassins. Capture, not kill. We aren't murderers. We go to the party, mingle there for a few hours, establish ourselves to everyone present that we are guests, just like them. Drink a little. Play a little poker- they have a huge casino there, bigger than this one. That way, no one can say, 'I saw a couple of suspicious-looking guys at the casino.' But when I give the signal, you follow my orders." Percy handed him an earpiece. "You understand the plan, am I right?"

"You are."

Percy checked his watch. It was a little past noon. "Ready to go?"

Nico exhaled and nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm ready."

Percy made his way to the door of their suite and held it open for Nico. He paused as Nico passed him in the hallway. "Hey..." he said.

Nico turned around and looked at him. "What's up?"

"Is this all going too fast for you?"

Nico shrugged. "Maybe. I don't know. But I kinda like it. It's how I function."

Percy nodded. "That's good. This kind of life changes a lot. I know that on my first week, if I had to do what you're doing, I'd probably be overwhelmed with pressure."

Hearing this from any other person, Nico would've passed it off as being a sympathetic comment with the intent to make the recipient feel better about themselves. Coming from Percy, it felt sincere.

"Thanks," said Nico. He offered a smile. "Let's go."

* * *

They finalized the details of the plan in the elevator.

Percy pulled a syringe out of one of his numerous pockets and handed it to Nico. "One prick, and they should be out," he said. "When I give the signal, go for Ethan. He's the one who isn't blonde-haired. New recruit. Should be a piece of cake for you."

Nico nodded and slipped it into the fold of his cuff, a trick he'd mastered during training. When needed, the point was sharp enough that it would pierce his dress shirt, so no one would ever even see the needle.

"Careful with that, though. We only have enough left for one stab. We need to make that one count."

"Go it," Nico replied, feeling confident about what they had to do.

"So here's what happens if we can't knock them out. First of all, ditch the needles overboard. We may have to make a quick getaway, and the last thing we need is to accidentally be knocked out."

Nico nodded. "Ditch the syringes overboard. Got it."

"Rendezvous at the stern of the boat. That's the back- the place where we'll enter," Percy continued. "I'll basically just tell you to dive into the water and plant the charges. After that, get back to the hotel. If I'm not back in fifteen minutes, you know what to do. I'd rather have everyone marooned _including_ me than no one marooned."

"Got it."

"If all goes well, we should be in and out by three or four. This shouldn't be too hard."

Famous last words.

The elevator doors opened. Through the glass doors to the hotel, they had a clear view through to the beach and to the ship they'd be infiltrating. It looked a lot more menacing now that Nico knew what they would have to do.

They set off for the ship.

* * *

Luke Castellan leaned against the bar. He didn't drink anything.

His eyes brightened when he saw two figures enter the ship's main deck, where the party was being thrown. He nudged his partner, Ethan. "They're here."

Ethan looked up, surprised. "Already?"

Luke nodded. "They're smarter than we give them credit for. Unfortunately for them, so are we."

He pushed off of the bar and started up a slow, leisurely walk to the poker table. Ethan hurried to catch up to him.

"You know the plan," hissed the veteran, "right?"

Ethan nodded. "Inside and out."

"You have the packages?"

Ethan grimaced and nodded. Carrying both of the heavy packages and stowing them away in the ship for disposal was hard, as they both weighed as much as a person. But he'd done it. Luke had called it his first real accomplishment as a Mechanic, which he figured was about as close as he would ever get to a compliment from his stony-faced, emotionless partner.

"Then get to it. You get the rookie. I have a score to settle with Jackson."

He stalked off. Though he purposefully made his way over to where the veteran Analyst was, Ethan knew that nothing would happen for at least another hour. Luke liked to drag things out.

Ethan put both his hands in his pockets. His left hand closed around the wooden blade of a switchblade and his right hand closed around the handle of a nine millimeter.

An burst of adrenalin rushed through his veins as his eyes locked onto their target. Nico di Angelo.

Showtime.

* * *

**Author's Notes:** It all goes down...in the next chapter.

Reviews would be greatly appreciated!

**-epicsilverbullet**


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